Never the same again
by Laelia Moondance
Summary: [Complete]Something mysterious happens that definitely changes Harry and Snape's perception of each other!Set in 6th year.HPSS slash.
1. Smoke

Disclaimer: Characters are created by J.K.Rowling, not me. There will be slash in this story, meaning a sexual relationship between two guys, namely Harry and Snape. If you're squeamish about it, then please leave now.

'Thoughts'

"Speech"

_Spells, emphasis

* * *

_

Smoke

"20 points from Gryffindor because of your lack of respect, Potter" Snape spat in contempt.

Harry was so furious that he would have liked nothing more than to hex Snape into oblivion right there and then.

Staring at Harry and Snape, Dumbledore noticed that they seemed to channel so much mutual hatred that he would not be surprised if they came to blows. He sighed in exasperation.

How many times had he tried to tell Severus that Harry was _not_ James, and that he could not blame Harry for what James did? It appeared as if though his words had fallen on deaf ears, for Snape was still using every single opportunity possible to make Harry's life as miserable.

Suddenly, he stumbled upon an ingenious plan that would definitely improve things between them. Dumbledore's eyes twinkled in amusement. This would be a fun year indeed. Now, if only he could find a suitable opportunity…

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"Argh, I can't stand him! Sometimes I feel that the only reason I exist is so that Snape can have an excuse to take points from Gryffindor". Ron threw him an incredulous look, as if to say that he was a fool for thinking that.

"Hey mate, nobody blames you. If anyone is at fault, it is that unruly git!"

Once again, Harry could not help feeling a familiar sense of injustice. Honestly, he did nothing wrong. Ever since he stepped into Hogwarts, Snape already had picked on him. Although Harry knew it was because of his father that Snape was treating him like this, it did not make his 'bullying' any easier to take. Hell, sometimes Harry even wondered if Snape was jealous because of his fame.

But the worse thing was, he loathed his fame and all the crap that came along with it. If that was the cause of Snape's irrational behavior towards him, then Harry would gladly give up his title, complete with silver platter and all.

Indeed, Harry would be delighted just to have one day when he was not expected by everyone to defeat the dark lord, one day when he would not be recognized in the wizarding world as "Harry Potter, the boy who survived the killing curse".

He guessed that not even Hermione or Ron would understand how much he longed to be just like them, to be ordinary.

"Well, there's no use in lamenting about Professor Snape. Come on, we still have to face double potions with him, so Harry, please try your best to control your temper!" Despite facing the glares coming from both Ron and Harry, Hermione took no heed of it.

"You know that McGonagall would not be pleased if she knew that you had landed yourself with another detention with Professor Snape!"

Harry was forcibly reminded of the incident not to long ago, when Professor McGonagall had caught wind of him having to serve another detention for Snape yet again.

Her eyes had flashed warningly, nostrils flared as she said in a dangerous voice, " Not again, Potter! How is Gryffindor going to win the House Cup if their captain is too busy attending detentions as if though his life depended on it!", before walking away in a huff.

He winced just at the thought of another occurrence of that sort. Sighing, he trudged grudgingly towards the dungeons alongside Ron and Hermione.

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"Your have an hour to prepare the Draught of Dreams. Failure to complete it will result in zero marks, so it would be in your best interest to use every minute wisely. Your time starts, NOW!" Snape drawled in an unpleasant tone.

Harry was determined to be on his best behaviour in order to escape detention with Snape. Sadly though, vowing was one thing, doing it was another, especially when it came to this potion. His concentration was fast slipping away due to the slightly hypnotizing fumes that all the cauldrons were giving out. Sneaking a glance at his fellow classmates, Harry noticed that he was not the only one, for everyone save for Hermione had a slightly glazed look in their eyes.

Professor Snape did not appear to be stunned though. On the contrary, he seemed to be observing how his students were making a fool of themselves (think dreamy expressions, slight drooling) with evident disgust on his face.

Harry was only dully aware of the classroom gradually blurring in front of his eyes. Dudley and his malicious gang swam into view. Strangely, he was younger, about nine years old. But, he still had the mind of a seventeen year old.

"_Alright there, Potter? You look as if though you might faint anytime. Come on gang, beat him!", Dudley laughed evilly. Instinctively, he whipped out his wand and started hexing the evil gang. He was just savouring the satisfaction of releasing his pent up frustrations at the gang when…_

"Mr Potter! Stop at once!". He felt his wand slip out of his hand. He was still in a daze and a little disorientated. Slowly, he realized that he was back in class.

Looking around, he was shocked to see several of his classmates on the floor, unconscious, not to mention potion spilled all over the floor.

"Potter, explain yourself!"

"What?"

"It seems that you are not capable of explaining why you chose to stun the class at random and cause the class to be in such an untidy state. Now then, since it is apparent that you are in need of a more suitable occasion to hex others, you will meet me in the Great Hall at 1p.m. for a duel. 50 points from Gryffindor. Now, if you would excuse me, I have a class to awaken."

"_Ennervate!" _Professor Snape called out commandingly. One by one, the students slowly regained consciousness. Several of them were shocked to see warts on their faces, chicken wings instead of arms and noses as big and red as Rudolph the reindeer himself.

Not wanting to embarrass himself any further, Harry hastily collected his things, cleared his cauldron and left the dungeons wordlessly.

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His stomach coiled uncomfortably at the thought of facing Snape. Snape obviously wanted to humiliate him in front of the school! As he did not want Ron and Hermione to worry about him, he had escaped from the dungeons at the first opportunity he had.

Now, sitting in his dormitory alone, he was left alone in his own thoughts. Not even Hermione could help him to worm out of this.

'I can tell Professor McGonagall about the situation, she would definitely understand.' An image of Snape sneering at him for being a coward flashed before his eyes.

'But that does not solve the problem. Snape would most likely just find another excuse to get me to duel with him or to do something even more embarrassing.' Harry weighed his options. Either he faced this, or make Snape more angry, which would only result in more punishments for him. In addition, if he did not appear at the Great Hall, he was sure that Snape would gleefully spread the word around. Within a week, he would be deemed as a wimp and coward to not only Snape, but the whole school.

It wasn't as if the whole school had not turned on him before, but as a self respecting teenager, Harry did have his pride. Anyway, the whole 'silent treatment' deal was rather horrible. He preferred that the whole school did not turn on him again, thank you very much. Therefore, not turning up was definitely not an option.

As his "moment of death" was swiftly approaching, he sadly stood up and headed to the Great Hall.

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Severus was starting to regret his impulsive decision earlier on. He wanted to take an opportunity to teach that arrogant boy a lesson, but had not stopped to think of the consequences. What if he lost the duel? He was going to live in utter humiliation for centuries to come.

Oh well, what's done is done. He would just put in his best effort to ensure that Potter got his just desserts.

Before he knew it, it was time. Smirking slightly to himself, he sauntered towards the Great Hall, robes billowing out behind him.

Upon arriving at the Great Hall, he sat down with a mixture of excitement and anticipation. His hawk-like eyes briefly swept across the students in search of a certain raven-haired boy.

Good. The boy had not forgotten their duel. Abruptly, he stood up and headed towards the center of the Great Hall, beckoning Potter with a swift move of his hand.

Dumbledore watched from the staff table silently, his right hand gripping his wand should the need to hex them apart arise.

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'This is it', Harry thought nervously. Ignoring the curious gazes of his fellow Gryffindors, he rose from the table and headed towards Snape.

"Surely you know proper dueling etiquettes? Unless my memory has failed me, you had experience in dueling in your second year, have you not?" The way he phrased his sentence was such that if anyone heard him, they would instantly have known that he was stating a fact, not asking a question.

There was the sound of gasps coming from many students when they spotted Harry and Professor Snape drawing their wands. Both of them bowed in unison, though it was more due to tradition than respect.

Dumbledore looked at the oncoming combat with growing interest.

'This could be very interesting indeed', he pondered with a merry sparkle in his eyes. Therefore, it was no surprise that he made no attempt to stop teacher and student. In fact, he even subtly encouraged them by being the judge for their duel.

"Ok, on the count of 3. 1, 2…..3! ", he called out in a booming voice.

Cries of "_Expelliarmus_!" and "_Stupefy_" were heard.

"_Avis!"_ Snape turned into a bird, causing laughter to erupt from the students. However, he turned back into human form within a minute

"_Confundus!"_, he snarled. Harry was immediately left with a dazed look in his eyes, but figured out what was going on quickly and hastily muttered the counter-charm.

"_Stupefy!"_ both of them shouted in unison.

There was a blinding flash of bluish light and smoke which engulfed the entire hall. After coughing fits from students and professors alike ceased because Dumbledore had the good sense to mutter a spell to rid the hall of smoke, there was silence. Then, Professor Snape and Harry Potter were found lying on the floor, unconscious.

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	2. Mayhem ensues

A/N: Please review if you like it so far…Constructive criticism is welcomed but no flames! When I write about Snape, Snape is actually in Harry's body and when I write about Harry, he is in Snape's body. Confused? Just read on, you'll get what I mean.

'Thoughts'

"Speech"

_Spells, emphasis_

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Mayhem ensue

"Severus, you're awake!", Madam Pomfrey exclaimed in delight.

"Wha-?" He muttered incoherently to himself. Strange, his voice sounded different as compared to usual. He opened his eyes blearily. After a brief moment however, his surroundings came into focus.

"Severus you have finally awoken!", he heard Professor McGonagall telling him. He still felt a little disorientated. What was going on? He must still be dreaming. Just then, he saw himself, or more accurately, the body of Severus Snape lying down in a bed next to him. He could only stare in disbelief. Upon catching sight of the body that was supposed to be his, Snape glanced down at his 'own' body and got the shock of his life.

"Ahhhhh!!!!!", he screamed in a most un-Severus like manner before fainting again.

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"Harry? Harry! You're awake !", Professor McGonagall exclaimed joyfully.

'Oh great, I'm in the hospital wing again...'

"I'm afraid I have some bad news for you, Harry. You better brace yourself".

If the frown on Professor McGonagall's face was anything to go by, something extremely serious had happened. Harry gulped and played with the hem of his shirt, doing anything to prolong hearing the words that was about to follow.

Surely it could not be worst than having Sirius dead right? Nothing could be worst than that. He had only just come to terms with the death itself, despite it happening one year ago.

Apparently Harry was about to be proved horribly wrong.

"Do you remember when you were dueling with Professor Snape?" Harry nodded. "The cause for the situation remains unclear, but apparently, you exchanged bodies with Professor Snape."

Harry blinked.

"Pardon? For a moment, I thought you said that I exchanged bodies with Sn- Professor Snape." The elderly Head of Gryffindor House gave him a sad smile.

Harry was about to laugh hysterically when he noticed that the person in the neighbouring bed was starting to regain consciousness. Harry had to grip the side of the bed, as his world spun for a moment. There was no mistaking that messy jet black hair that had been a part of him for sixteen years. The person next to him was well, Snape in his body.

Snape, current owner of Harry's body, looked a fine shade of green. In fact, Snape appeared as if though he was going to throw up.

Harry wallowed in despair.

'Who knew, with his kind of downtrodden luck, he might even be stuck inside Snape's body forever!' What a cheerful thought.

"You! What infernal curse did you use? Undo it at once!", Snape screeched at him. Hearing his voice come out of his previous body in such a horrid manner, Harry winced visibly.

"What kind of sicko do you think I am? Why would I want to change bodies with _you_?" Harry yelled in frustration, conveniently forgetting that Snape, although trapped in Harry's body, was still a professor.

"Stop arguing at once! Clearly, Albus is the only one capable of changing the two of you back."

Snape gave Professor McGonagall an impatient snort. She closed her eyes, as if willing herself to remember that it was Snape, her fellow colleague and not a student that was being rude to her.

"However, since he would not be here as he has some important affairs to settle, I suggest that you two find a way to get along."

"Noooooo! Please Professor McGonagall, Madam Pomfrey, anything but this. I'm willing to do anything! I promise never to get into trouble ever again!" Harry was prepared to move heaven and earth if need be; even the prospect of never playing Quidditch again was better than living in Snape's foul body for goodness knew how long.

"I'm sorry Potter, this kind of case is unheard of in the wizarding world-"

"But I'll be stuck in his body for who knows when-"

"The headmaster will be back in a month. Meanwhile, Madam Pomfrey and I will be doing our best to help." Professor McGonagall placed a firm hand on Harry's shoulder, as if she thought he was on the verge of running out of Hogwarts in a mad search for Dumbledore.

The horrible news finally set in.

No longer able to face them, Harry twisted out of the elderly woman's grip, dodged out of Madam Pomfrey's futile attempts at bringing him back to the bed and dashed out of the Hospital Wing.

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Harry ran for what felt like hours, ignoring the stitch at his side. His only goal in mind was to reach the Room of Requirement.

In utter desperation, he concentrated hard on a room where he could stay to think about his thoughts without people stumbling in to disturb him. A pale yellow door revealed itself to him.

Out of habit, Harry dug into the right hand pocket of his cloak for his wand. However, he fished out Snape's wand, which was charcoal black with a faint white tip as opposed to his brown one instead. The wand gave off ominous green sparks and shivered slightly in his hand. Not wanting to get a bad case of magical backlash, Harry waited. When it appeared that the wand accepted him, Harry used it to lock the door He sighed. Even his wand was different now.

Glancing across the room, he located a comfy brown leather armchair and sat down on it gratefully. Harry absently gazed into the crimson fire that looked as if though it was mocking him, all the while having an internal battle within his head.

'What should I do? I can't tell Hermione or Ron, they would not believe me. Anyway, if even Madam Pomfrey is at a loss over this 'crisis', then all the more they would not know how to help me.'

Fleetingly, an image of Hermione exclaiming, "Professor Snape, do you need a vacation?" entered his mind when he tried to picture telling her the truth. Besides, telling the truth would only make them upset and it did not really serve any purpose. Ok, so telling anyone was definitely out of the question.

Harry opened his eyes and sighed in defeat. As he scanned the room, his gaze landed on a mirror not too far away from him.

Oddly, this mirror did not seem like those magical mirrors that he had the misfortune of stumbling upon. Those talkative mirrors were certainly annoying. This one was just like a normal muggle one.

He held his breath when he looked into the mirror and saw Snape's reflection staring back at him.

That greasy hair, hooked nose…It was one thing to see it from afar, it was another experience altogether to see it so close up.

Harry never knew that Snape had such large pores on his face.

Out of curiosity, he lifted his sleeves. Right on his left forearm was the mark of a death eater, just as Harry expected. He surveyed it with disgust before pulling his sleeves down promptly. Harry was rather unnerved by how obviously the dark mark stood out from his lean arm.

Unconsciously, Harry ran a hand through his hair like he always did, but stopped when he touched his "new hair". It was every bit as greasy as it looked.

'Ugh…does he ever wash his hair?'

Deciding that the state of his hair needed to be rectified immediately, Harry pictured a bathroom, complete with bath towels and all. The room instantly responded and added a bottle of lemon scented shampoo/soap to the heap of freshly laundered bath towels next to the sink.

He was immensely grateful to the room as he peeled off his robes and stood under the shower. The feeling of warm water upon his skin was truly relaxing.

He squeezed some shampoo onto his hands and spread it thoroughly through his hair.

'Much better'

Sometimes, he preferred to do things 'the muggle way'. This was one of such times. Odd really, how he seemed to have developed a fondness for bathing. He deduced it was probably because it was one of the few times during the day that he was allowed out of his cupboard under the stairs when he was living in Number four, Privet Drive.

He jerked out of his thoughts when Snape's, or should he say his soapy hands ran across his arms and chest.

'Oh well, Snape was not much of a body builder', he surveyed critically though he dismissed that thought almost immediately.

Hell, Harry was in no position to complain. His malnourished body was nothing to brag about either. He could only hope that Snape would not make snide comments about Harry's less-than-ideal body.

His hands moved down his taut stomach, down…Harry's eyes snapped open when he touched Snape's manhood.

'Holy crap! He was huge!'

Great, here was yet another reason for him to wallow in despair. If Snape saw Harry's relatively averaged sized penis, he was sure that he would have to endure Snape's sarcastic comments for many torturous months to come.

Just then, he took in the sight of his, no, Snape's pale skin.(the skin on his body you sicko, what were you thinking?;p).

'Boy that man's in desperate need of a suntan!' Harry laughed in amusement at the mental image of Snape clad in nothing but black swimming trunks (it was simply beyond Harry's imagination to picture Snape wearing anything but black), lying down on the beach for the world to see.

He washed out the remaining soup suds in his ears before drying himself. Harry donned on his robes, but not before muttering a cleansing charm on his robes so that they smelled as if though had just been washed.

He had to thank Hermione for making him remember that spell one day.

Ah, he felt so much better. His hair lost its greasy quality. Now, it hung lank and a little damp.

He focused on picturing the room he was in previously and the bathroom turned back to the room with the pale yellow door. As he settled back on the leather armchair, Harry experienced such a strong urge to stay there for the rest of the month until Dumbledore came back to resolve the problem that the only thing stopping him was the thought of Snape tearing him with his bare hands.

'That evil bat had better not cause any damage to my body, if not…' Harry smirked evilly (a look that was surprisingly easy to accomplish while he was in Snape's body).

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Snape was in a foul mood as usual.

'Who does that Potter think he is, rushing off like that?' Always the coward, that boy was.

Snape moved swiftly, robes still billowing out behind him despite the fact that he was no longer in his own body. Snape did not want anybody to see him, in case he had to answer stupid questions or requests coming from Potter's idiotic herd of friends.

"_Aparecium_", he muttered, revealing the previously invisible words that were inscribed on the walls of the dungeons.

He tapped the words smartly with his, no, Harry's wand and stepped right through the wall. Snape stalked into the dungeons, making the familiar left turn, followed by a right turn. He felt a sense of relief when his familiar room came into view.

"_Weak-minded fools!"_ , he hissed at the wards guarding his room. The two swords that originally blocked his entry immediately sprung apart to allow him access to his room.

'Back at my rooms at last!' , he thought in pure relief.

As soon as he had relaxed, Snape began thinking of the possible solutions to his problem, since he was more or less over the 'I'm-so-disgusted-at-being-stuck-in-his-body-that-I'm-going-to-throw-up' stage. Sadly though, despite having vast knowledge of potions, plants and medicines, no counter-curse came to mind.

He longed to pull out this unruly hair that was now temporarily his, because of its resemblance to the person who had caused him so much pain in his years at Hogwarts as a student.

Up till now, he could not understand why James and his gang had chosen to pick on him. Yes, he was without a doubt an easy target, but he was not the only one. There were so many other students that James Potter could have selected to torment.

'Why me?'

Like so many times, he could feel hatred coursing through his veins, even though his time at Hogwarts as a student was well over 20 years ago. Was it wrong of him to want to be popular, or maybe even well-liked, or admired just like any other student? Was it wrong for him to try and seek out the friends he never had in his whole life?

'Snap out of it!', he raged silently at himself. If anyone deserved to have a chance to wallow in self-pity, it was not him. He did not deserve it, and he would not want to anyway.

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Harry entered the Great Hall amidst the sea of students. He spotted the all too familiar flaming red hair and brown bushy hair, but stopped himself from walking by their side. Instead, he headed miserably towards where he knew Snape usually seated.

He scanned the crowd for Snape, hoping that Snape had the good sense to sit at the Gryffindor table like Harry usually would. It probably was too much to ask of Snape to sit next to Ron and Hermione, taking into account how much Snape hated the two of them. No matter what, he was fairly certain that Snape would rather let the whole school know about this whole incident and risk being called a basket case than to sit with them.

Luckily, he was not disappointed. He located Snape fairly quickly. He was sitting next to Seamus and Neville. Oh well, that was good enough for Harry.

He could not help but notice that Ron and Hermione kept shooting Snape anxious and worried glances, as if though they thought that they had somehow managed to offend Harry. Perhaps that was what they assumed to be the reason why Snape a.k.a. Harry did not sit next to them.

He was deep in thought when delicious smells wafted towards his nose.

Harry could not help but let out a tiny gasp when he saw the wonderful spread that he had in front of him. 'Teachers definitely had better food than students', he concluded almost immediately. He could vouch for that with hundred per cent certainty.

There were all kinds of food, from spicy meatballs, cocktail sausages to unique cuisine that he had never seen before. They appeared to be wrapped in some greenish thing. Upon tasting it, he realized that it was seaweed. There was even rice wrapped inside. This rice was unlike any he had ever tried before. He was quick to mentally declare this special item as one of his top favourite foods.

There was even a steaming pot that was filled with lobster soup. It was simply delicious. At last, the plates refilled themselves with what, in Harry's opinion, was the best part of dinner---dessert!

He was elated to see his second favourite food in the world, ice-cream served in tall wine glasses.

He tried to keep himself from grinning like an idiot when he tasted his first spoonful of lime ice-cream.

Harry could not help but close his eyes briefly, savouring the feel of the cool and refreshing ice cream and the way it slid down easily down his throat.

When he opened his eyes, he saw that a few of the professors were looking at him strangely.

He immediately tried to stop showing how much he enjoyed the ice-cream and focused on keeping his expression blank. Jeez, it was much harder to do than it looked. Harry supposed that Snape was not much of a person with sweet tooth, after all, he had never seen Snape eating anything dessert at all. Nonetheless, he was not about to sacrifice his love for desserts just to preserve Snape's 'bad guy' reputation.

Just before everyone started heading out towards their own dormitories, he saw Snape signaling to him to leave the Great Hall. Harry tried his best to remain calm before strolling out of the Great Hall. He waited outside for a few moments before Snape came out as well.

"Well Potter, like the new body?" , Snape asked with a hint of arrogance in his voice. Harry deliberated on mimicking vomiting gestures, but decided against it.

"Why did you call me out, Sn-sir?" he asked instead.

"What were you thinking? Were you even using your common sense at all?" Harry resisted the urge to glare at him.

"Maybe it's your acting skills that are completely lacking, or perhaps, you don't care if the whole school finds out. Let me tell you, I would die before I allow you to tear my reputation into shreds."

Harry hated himself for feeling slightly intimidated. However, having emerald green eyes instead of harsh black ones caused Snape to lose most of his intimidating powers, thus, Harry was relatively unmoved. Harry turned around and was about to leave; he was not about to put up with Snape's insults any longer. It was Snape's fault that they dueled and got stuck in this situation in the first place, so what right did he have to throw out insults?

Snape blocked Harry's way before he could walk away. "And where do you think you're going? In case your dim-witted mind has failed to register, you're in no position to return to your dormitories tonight. I would not be accused of sleeping in the same dormitory as other snot-nosed Gryffindors."

"So where do you suggest I sleep then, _sir?"_

Snape looked as if he had lemon juice in his mouth. "You have to sleep in my room tonight."

Harry felt a sense of uneasiness sweep through him. He could only imagine what horrors Snape might inflict upon him.

"Rest assured, I would not do anything to harm my own body", Snape added with a hint of malice in his voice before leading the way.

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"Stand outside the dungeons, if you please" , Snape said with fake politeness in his voice.

Harry could barely hide his surprise when he saw that there was now a hole in the dungeon wall. He followed Snape wordlessly towards his room.

Unless his ears deceived him, Harry distinctly heard Snape utter the password --- "Weak-minded fools".

'Typical Slytherin attitude', he thought in slight amusement before he entered Snape's room.

The room was so dark that he had to take a moment for his eyes to focus. It was mostly grey, giving the room an overall depressing look.

Spotting a couch nearby, he asked, "Can I take the couch, or do I have to sleep on the floor, sir?" Unexpectedly, Snape let him have the couch.

'Wow, his first attempt at being human towards me', Harry noted in shock before he heading towards the bathroom. He transfigured a toothbrush from a pen (third year transfiguration) he found there and brushed his teeth with it. After that, he wearily dragged himself to the couch where he fell asleep almost immediately.

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Snape was rather surprised that Potter had chosen so willingly to sleep on the couch. He had expected that boy to argue with him for the bed. Well, maybe that boy was not that bad after all…Oh who was he kidding?

'That boy is every bit as bad as his father. Just because he offered to sleep on the couch, that does not mean he isn't a spoiled brat', Snape concluded as he drank his usual dosage of dreamless potion. Within minutes, he was fast asleep.

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He was up at 5 a.m., just like he did for every morning for the past 10 years. Potter was still asleep on the couch, blissfully oblivious to his surroundings.

As silent as he could, Snape unlocked the cupboard in which he stored all his potions ingredients and hundreds of scrolls of Potions essays. He picked up a quill with a red phoenix feather, dipped it in red ink (which creepily resembled blood) and started to mark the scrolls.

As his hand flew across the scrolls effortlessly, his sharp eyes spotted out the mistakes of all the students and he corrected them. He placed small ticks that were almost identical for every script. What a sad life he had, spending his mornings marking scripts that did not deserve to be marked in the first place. Hell, his students hardly knew anything about what they were writing.

It was quite torturous really, having to endure the stupidity of his students. Just when he thought that he had seen the worst, a student had to show him that stupidity could reach new heights.

Before long, sunlight filtered through the windows of his room.

He chanced a glance at Potter and saw that he was starting to wake up.

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Harry looked around sleepily, still a little groggy from sleep. Then, he stood up noiselessly and staggered towards the bathroom. Hey, he was not one who would live through a single day without brushing his teeth. Even though he was not in his own body, he still felt compelled to do so out of habit.

As he stared into the mirror (unfortunately, it was a magical mirror), it commented, "What's that huge ugly thing on your face? Oh, it's just your nose."

Already in a foul mood (perhaps it was something to do with being in that grouchy bat's body), Harry was fairly tempted to smash the mirror into a thousand pieces. However, he knew that Snape would not be pleased.

Sighing in defeat, he could only try his best to ignore the mirror and to leave the bathroom as soon as possible.

All of a sudden, he remembered that he had to teach lessons in place for Snape!

"But", he thought in a panic, "I'm horrible at potions. How am I supposed to teach for Snape?" He guessed that he would have to improvise. After all, how hard could teaching be?

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Snape nearly gathered up his stuff to prepare for his first lesson of the day when he realized that he was no longer a professor and currently had to act as a student.

'Oh great, an encore session of school, just what I need', he noted with dread.

"Potter, bring your time-table to me. Meet me outside the dungeons at 7.30. Oh, and do try to make sure that as little people as possible sees you" , he spat out monotonously, after which he started to write out the topics that Potter was supposed to teach to his respective classes for the day on a spare piece of parchment.

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He hoped that Potter did not screw up his lessons too badly. His reputation as a renowned potions Master was at stake here. He was sorely tempted to tap his foot in impatience while waiting for Potter but stopped himself. Severus Snape never tapped his foot in public view, regardless of whether he was in another body or not.

"_Tempus_", he muttered while he rapped his wand on his wrist. A translucent digital watch immediately appeared on his wrist. Hah! Potter was late. That boy was never early. Snape highly suspected that Potter could never be early even if his life depended on it.

Just then, Harry came around the corner, panting slightly with the time-table clutched tightly in his hand.

"Nobody saw me. I waited until all the Gryffindors-"

"Here, take this. Please do not disgrace me, Potter. If you do, I swear to Merlin that you would serve detention for the rest of the year". Snape watched as Potter took a look at the long list he had complied and gulped. Unable to resist, Snape indulged in a smirk that, truth be told, looked rather weird since Harry's facial muscles were not accustomed to smirking.

The smirk faded as soon as Harry left. Now, Snape had to worry about History of Magic.

"Giants have long been afraid of wizards since the 14th century…", Professor Binns droned on. Hell, his lessons were SO boring! Snape nearly wanted to yell out in boredom and frustrations. Finally, he occupied himself by thinking of various potions and all the ingredients that were required to create it.

He was in the midst of preparation for 'The Cooling Potion' when Granger decided to whisper to him.

"Harry, what's wrong with you? We haven't seen you since yesterday evening in the Great Hall! Where did you go last night?", she spoke in an undertone.

Snape did not feel compelled to answer; therefore he decided to pretend that he did not hear her. He did a fairly respectable imitation of someone who was listening intently to what Binns was lecturing on about.

He saw Weasley and Granger exchange puzzled looks but chose to pay no attention to it. Finally, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Granger giving up on her futile attempts to catch his attention. As he expected, she immersed herself in the world of history almost immediately.

After what felt to him like an eternity, the bell finally rang, marking the end of the lesson. Faint murmurs of "Goodbye Professor Binn!" were heard. Up next was potions class. Snape reluctantly set off towards the dungeons speedily, making sure that he was too quick for that red headed fool and Muggle-born to catch up with him.

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Potter strolled into the class as if though he had all the time in the world, even though lessons should have commenced 15 minutes ago.

"Class, today we are going to learn how to identify a poisonous potion." Strangely, Potter had an odd gleam in his eyes. It took Snape about a second to recognize it as a mischievous gleam.

'Oh no'. A horrible feeling of dread settled around his navel. There was the sound of pages being turned hastily echoing throughout the dungeons.

"Now, I would need some volunteers".

Snape, despite himself, felt highly amused when he saw Draco puffing out his chest expectedly. Despite being rumoured to favour Draco, he only did so because of Lucius. Honestly, Draco was too proud for his own good.

"Her-Granger, Weasley and Longbottom, please come forward".

Snape had to fight hard to stop himself from laughing when he saw Draco deflating as if though a pin had poked him.

He watched carefully as he saw Potter beckoning them over. After a few minutes, the three of them stepped away from Potter.

"Now class, we are going to play a game. They (Potter gestured at Weasley, Granger and Longbottom) each represent a potion. Out of the three potions, 1 of them is poisonous. Your job is to guess which one. They will read out descriptions of their respective potions. We won't be needing the textbooks today", Potter said with a grin.

'Ugh, what's with the game? You know very well that I never play games', Snape thought in disgust, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. The students were sending "Professor Snape" questioning looks.

"Ro-Weasley, you first". Weasley stepped forward nervously, cleared his throat and began to read.

"I…The potion is blue. It's made up of a tooth of a vampire, the wool of a sheep and the tail of a lizard", he said uncertainly.

Granger stepped forward, "This potion is purple and the ingredients are: A rose petal, globbelpig mushrooms, a worm and a slice of cheddar cheese", she announced to the class.

Neville told the class that his potion was red and that it was formed by mixing snake's blood, a handful of dead slugs and a lock of the brewer's hair before the three of them went back to their seats.

"Ok, before you make your decision, I would like to tell you this: Those that choose the right option will have a week free from potions homework. Of course, Granger, Weasley and Longbottom would not be allowed to take part", Potter informed the class cheerfully. To say that the class was shocked would be a severe understatement. All of them looked as if a strong gust of wind could knock them over.

Excited murmurings were heard. Snape wanted to hang himself right there and then.

'Damn Potter, wait until I get my hands on you', he thought irritably.

Harry put up a hand to silence the class. The whole class calmed down almost instantaneously. He took out his quill and some parchment.

"Who says it's Weasley?", he questioned. Several hands shot into the air. He mumbled to the quill and the quill took down the names of the students swiftly.

"Granger?" More hands went up. After the energetic quill paused, he asked again, "Longbottom?". There were even more hands that were raised. When the quill had finished taking down the names, Potter broke the news.

"And the answer is: Granger!". Cheers erupted from the students, though the students looked at "Professor Snape" and stopped almost immediately.

"You might ask what the purpose of this lesson is. Well, now you know that you cannot identify a poisonous potion just solely on their ingredients alone. If you happened to notice, the potion that Granger represented did not seem to have ingredients that sounded as dangerous as Longbottom's. Now, to find out if a potion is poisonous, all you have to do is move your wand in a small circular motion like this", he demonstrated, waving his wand in the air, "and saying '_inficio'_".

"We will try this in the next lesson. Granger, Weasley, Longbottom, I shall award you 100 points each for being such spontaneous volunteers. Also, you will not have to do homework for a week!", he said with a silly grin on his face.

'Ok that's it', Snape thought miserably, 'I'm really going to jump in front of an _Avada Kedavra_.'

"Smith, Finnigan, Thomas, Patil and Corner, you are excused from homework for this week as promised. Oh", Potter exclaimed in surprise while looking at the clock on the wall, "It seems as if we still have 10 minutes left. Never mind, you can all be dismissed from class 10 minutes earlier. Good day!", he quipped before heading out of the dungeons.

Snape grabbed his bag immediately and walked briskly out of the classroom.

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	3. Getting to know you

'Thoughts'

"Speech"

_Spells, emphasis_

//Parseltongue//

* * *

Getting to know you

Once he turned round the corner, Harry fell into a fit of laughter.

Oh, the look on Snape's face was priceless! Recalling the expression on Draco and his fellow Slytherins' face, he began laughing even harder. Teaching was so much fun! He was now beaming so hard that the sides of his mouth hurt, but he was too pleased with himself to stop himself from smiling.

'Maybe exchanging places with Snape wasn't so bad after all…'He was humming softly when he heard footsteps behind him.

"Potter!", Snape spat, his face contorted into a look of pure disgust and hatred.

Geez, Snape really knew how to make him appear even uglier than he already was. Harry prepared himself for his fate as Snape loomed into view.

"That is unacceptable! I would not have you portraying me as a pally, cheery kind of teacher! You…",he stopped in mid-sentence.

Snape listened carefully for anyone who might overhear. He was apparently satisfied, for he continued, "just to let you know, two can play at this game. If you want to embarrass me, I can easily do the same to you. I would not hesitate to hex all of your precious little friends and…".

Harry did not register what else Snape was saying, for all he felt was an indescribable sense of horror washing down upon him. His grin had long slid down his face. Although he might have gotten a little carried away with enjoying his new privileges as a professor, he still did not deserve such nastiness from Snape.

"Is that clear?", Snape demanded.

"What?" Harry asked in confusion.

Snape was furious at Harry. How could he appear so innocent when he had done this to him? However, he could sense that Harry was genuinely confused when he had finished threatening him.

It was so strange to see a mirror image of himself looking confused. He had seen Harry with a look of utter fear when he mentioned about his friends. Trust honorable Potter to always worry about his friends. After he had finished venting, he felt much better. He felt so tempted to carry out his threat, but now his temper had disappeared.

"Do not, I repeat: Do not ever play games with my students again." Snape's tone spoke volumes about Harry's far-from-happy ending should he choose to disobey.

Harry looked surprised for a fleeting moment before he regained his composure.

"You might want to bring along some robes when you meet me outside the dungeons at 5 in the evening", Snape added as an afterthought. Harry nodded his head before he set off to teach his next potions class- the third-years.

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Snape strode purposefully towards the library. He guessed that he would have to act more like Potter now, especially after he had promised him. People might think that he was one who would not keep his promises, but actually they were wrong. They simply made judgments without testing out that theory.

'There is not much people know about me anyway'. Hell, where did that self-pitying thought come from? Snape banished it from his mind before it could pollute his mind.

He guessed that Potter's friends, Granger and Weasley would be there, therefore he intended to explain what might have seemed like "strange" behaviours from him. He was not disappointed. Located in a corner were the two of them, doing their work, Ron obviously more distracted than Hermione. Ron whispered to Hermione and before long, Hermione looked at him and waved for him to join them. Snape mentally grimaced as he attempted a smile.

He guessed it might have looked a little weird because Granger shot him a bewildered look. He wiped off that expression from his face immediately and just focused on reaching the two of them.

"Hey Harry!" Weasley called out in greeting.

Granger had to shush him before he remembered that he was supposed to be quiet in a library. Ugh, for Potter's sake he supposed he had to practice smiling in front of the mirror so that his friends would not get suspicious.

'Why does Potter have to smile so much?', he thought, feeling a tad bit irritated at the cheerful twerp.

It was so annoying really. There was no purpose in smiling, it just let everyone know what you were feeling.

'Isn't it better if no one knew what you're thinking?', he contemplated silently.

He knew that Weasley and Granger were expecting an answer from him, so he just whispered "Hello" in an undertone. Glancing around, he realized that it was expected of him to start doing some homework like the two of them.

Stiffly, he removed some parchment and prepared to do some Charms homework.

Honestly, their homework was so easy, it was just merely naming how the concealment charm worked and what were the factors that affected the use of a concealment charm. Hah, Severus could do that charm with his eyes closed, let alone just merely stating the factors that contributed to the effectiveness of the concealment charm. After all, he did not manage to survive his Hogwarts days of being 'hunted' by James and his gang by walking around without a clue.

He was just starting to write out the second sentence of his answer when Granger handed him a piece of paper. Glancing at it irritably, he saw what was written on it. There, written on the paper in what unmistakably was Granger's neat writing, was:

"Where were you last night? Ron said you didn't return to your dormitory"

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He did his best to think of a suitable answer as quick as possible and wrote the first thing that came to his mind. Remembering to make his handwriting look like Potter's, he replied that he had to stay in the dungeons overnight because Snape punished him to scrap off all the remnants in the cauldrons without using magic, not allowing him to go unless he finished his job.

He saw Granger's eyes widen in indignation. Hastily, she passed the paper on to Weasley, who soon looked murderous. When the paper returned to him, he saw that Weasley had written in an untidy scrawl, complete with several holes in the parchment where he had stabbed the dots on his 'I's with a little too much force:

"Snape's an evil bastard, EVIL BASTARD!"

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Snape resisted the urge to throttle Weasley and Granger with every ounce of self control that he had and forced himself to reply instead that most likely he would have to help Snape scrub cauldrons until he was appleased. He returned to his charms homework, writing in what he hoped was an accurate imitation of Potter's scrawlings. This was how his homework looked like:

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All about the Concealment Charm

_The concealment charm is cast by when a person says "Amicio" while flicking his wand in a zigzag manner. The factors that affect the effectiveness of the usefulness charm is:_

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He was just about to continue again when he saw that Granger had replied again.

Sighing so softly that no one else could hear, he glanced at the parchment. Apparently Granger thought that he ought to tell McGonagall about it. Snape wrote for a while more before he finished the assignment.

Casting the spell that allowed him to see the time temporarily on his wrist, he saw that it was almost 5. He hurriedly scribbled that he had to see Professor Snape again on the paper before passing it back to Granger, ignoring the strange looks that she was giving him as he stood up and left the library.

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Harry knew that there was no way he would not be seen by any Gryffindor at all, but he chose the best time possible- the afternoon when he knew that most of the Gryffindors were in the library completing their work, to enter the Common Room.

He ignored the curious looks the Fat Lady gave him as he entered the common room for the second time that day. He could only imagine how confused the Fat Lady was to see what appeared to be Snape entering the Gryffindor Common Room not once, but twice on the same day.

Harry saw several first years gasping in surprise and pointing at him. He could not help but snap at the first years, though he was not a tiny bit remorseful about it. If anyone had a reason to be grumpy, it was him.

He entered his dormitory speedily, grabbed his robes and stuffed them underneath his own long, huge one.

His eyes skimmed across the room, checking for anything important that he might have left behind, to prevent scenarios whereby he had to enter the common room yet again. He spotted his favourite azure blue toothbrush. Hey, every boy has to have his favourite toothbrush right? He could hardly say that he preferred his transfigured one to the one that he held in his hand at the moment.

He grinned slightly to himself before tucking it underneath his robes and leaving the common room.

It was nearly time. Harry tried to move as fast as he could, but was slowed down considerably by all the things hidden under his robes. At last, he rushed to the entrance of the dungeons. He prayed that no student would see him in this flushed and disheveled state. He could only imagine how Snape would clobber him to death if he discovered that he had been humiliated yet again.

Not long after he arrived, Snape came. Snape looked at him in shock before moving in swiftly to uncover the hole in the wall. Not too long after, he snarled for him to enter the dungeons quickly. He could easily guess why Snape was so eager to let him in.

'Looks like Snape is quite image-conscious after all', he deliberated, feeling slightly amused by that thought.

However, he was wise not to mention anything to Snape, who in these few days, was as easy to agitate as a lighted fuse ready to explode.

Upon reaching Snape's room, he dumped his robes unceremoniously onto the couch. He looked at Snape before asking him where to put his robes. Snape seemed to consider for a short moment before telling him to put it in his wardrobe, just take special care to ensure that the robes were nowhere near his own.

Harry nodded and followed his instructions accordingly. After a few minutes of awkward silence, Harry decided to make a valiant attempt at conversation. "So, er, Professor Snape, how's things going for you?"

Snape shot him an evil glare. "That's none of your business. Thanks to you, you silly buffoon, I have to endure all the boring lessons and do all the ridiculously simple homework". Harry almost let out a chuckle, but refrained from doing so in the nick of time. He did not know if his laughter would cause Snape to misunderstand, making Snape think that he was mocking him.

He was unwilling to risk losing what could hardly qualify as the first civil conversation he had with Snape to a moment of stupidity. He was also dreadfully tempted to tell Snape that now he was experiencing what it was like to be on the receiving end of boring class after boring class, but once again, he had to refrain himself from doing so.

Instead, he replied in a bored voice, "Looking at all the students, asking them to flip open their books and to start doing their practical while I walk around the class, unsure of what to even look out for in their potions is not exactly my idea of fun either."

"Professor, could I ask you what I am allowed to do to make lessons more interesting then, if I am not allowed to organize games?"

Snape appeared to be thinking hard. After a moment's deliberation, he replied in a smooth drawl, "Well, you could always bewitch your potions textbook to be some other book that you can read in class. I'm sure your students would not be able to tell whether you're paying attention to what's happening in the class or whether you're doing something else."

Harry had to admit, that idea was kind of appealing. There was an uncomfortable silence.

"Sir, could you-"

"Just to let-"

Harry felt himself flush in embarrassment.

"Erm you go first", he told Snape uneasily. Snape seemed to be blissfully unaware of the uncomfortable tension that was in the air around them at the moment.

He continued smoothly as if though he had not been interrupted, "Just to let you know, I told Granger and Weasley that I was serving detention with you yesterday and that I would be serving detention with you almost everyday. This would give us the chance to do what we are supposed to do. Here, take your homework. I had to pretend to do some charms in the library, so I completed your charms for you. Do not expect for such luck again. The rest of your work is here", he said, handing Potter a notebook in which he had written down the homework for the day.

Harry was stunned to see that Snape actually bothered to write down the homework for him. Snape looked at him expectedly. It took a while for Harry to realize that Snape was expecting a mountain of essays to be handed to him.

"I left it in one of the cupboards in the dungeons room, I'll be right back", he informed Snape.

He hurried towards the locked cupboard in which he placed the essays, only managing to bring all the scrolls back by using a strong "_Locomotor_" spell to float the scrolls into the room. He placed them in a heap in front of Snape.

Honestly, how did Snape manage to finish marking all the scrolls?

'He must be using magic to do so', he decided before starting on his homework. He found himself almost thinking wistfully of how nice it would be if Hermione was here to teach him. Now, however, he had to refer to his textbooks almost all the time, slowing down the process in which he did his homework considerably.

Harry was doing his homework, furrowing his eyebrows in concentration when he noticed Snape getting up towards a veiled box. He could not help but look up curiously to see what was contained in it. He spotted a white and yellow snake, almost about six feet and twice the height of Harry. It was an albino snake.

"Hey Gaza, time for your meal", he distinctly heard Snape muttering.

Looking at 'Gaza', Harry strangely did not feel intimidated by its size at all. Perhaps it was due to the fact that he knew parseltongue. Harry noticed that Gaza was looking at Snape with a vicious gleam in its eye.

Suddenly, it dawned on him that Gaza must see Snape as an intruder. Harry immediately warned Snape to step back and started talking to Gaza.

//Hello,// he greeted her tentatively.

She looked surprised for a brief moment before she replied,//I never knew that you could ssssspeak parsssseltongue…//

Harry quickly went on to explain what had happened between Snape and him. When he had finished, the snake no longer looked as if though it were about to attack Snape. On the contrary, it seemed a little apologetic (if that was even possible for a snake).

Harry reassured Snape that it was safe to touch Gaza again. Snape seemed a little fascinated by the display of parseltongue that he had just heard, but that look disappeared so quickly it had Harry wondering if he had imagined it.

"Where did you get her from?", Harry asked inquisitively.

"She has been my pet since I was young", Snape admitted. Looking at Gaza, Harry could not help but find her beautiful. Gaza had slightly pinkish eyes. As she flickered her tongue in the air, Harry noticed that her tongue was a deep blue in colour. It was the first time he had ever come across an albino snake. Looking towards his right, he spotted a club not too far away from the veiled box.

"What is that? Is that a-", Harry started to question, but was cut off by Snape.

"Beater's club", Snape confessed, looking as though he would kill Harry if he laughed.

Harry did not feel like laughing at all. In fact, he felt awed by the fact that Snape was a beater. Never in a million years would he have guessed that Snape used to play Quidditch.

Harry watched as Snape went to yet another cupboard to retrieve what looked like a dead mouse from a large bag of dead mice. He felt a little sickened looking at that and tried to distract himself instead by thinking of how Snape could keep track of where he put all his things, since he seemed to store all his items in near-identical cupboards.

Harry watched dully as Gaza swallowed the mouse whole with its mouth wide open.

//Mmmmm… //, she hissed as she savoured her meal.

Overall, he felt that this was quite a productive day. He had kind of managed to look after a couple of potions classes, but what made this such a great day was that he managed to find out more about Snape. That in itself was an achievement.

Who knew that Snape would actually admit to all those things that he did? Harry stifled a yawn. He could feel fatigue settling in. After keeping his half-completed transfiguration essay away into his pale brown sling bag, he whipped out his toothbrush and went to brush his teeth.

"Goodnight, Professor Snape", he told Snape sleepily before heading towards the couch, falling asleep easily once more.

-----Dream-----

Harry was at the Yule Ball. Strangely though, he was not with Parvati, but he was with Ron and Hermione. They were having the time of their life, grooving to all the songs that the 'Weird Sisters' were singing.

The songs were rather catchy actually. He grinned at his closest friends mischievously, for he had just thought of a naughty idea.

Not caring that everyone was staring at him, he stood on stage, conjured up a pole and started grinding into it. He was a party animal; he was unstoppable. He executed all the pole dancing moves that he had secretly seen on the television at the Dursley's when they were asleep. Honestly, the Dursley's slept like pigs!

He slithered up the pole, gasping at the cool feel of the pole against his skin. He felt his member starting to get hard. Smiling at the crowd, he beckoned for Ron and Hermione to join him on the stage. There were fireworks behind him, as the three of them starting to club harder than they had ever done in their lives, waving their hands in the air and swaying their bodies in time to the music.

-----End of dream-----

Snape was woken up by some sound. He looked around in confusion, trying to find the source of the sound. He felt his eyes widen in astonishment as he saw Harry (in Snape's body of course), doing some strange erotic dance. Apparently, Potter was asleep and was unaware of what his body was doing.

Snape felt blood rush up to his cheeks at this display. He watched for a moment, horrified and yet fascinated at the same time. But, he quickly snapped out of that state and berated himself for displaying such stupid behaviour.

"Potter. POTTER!!!", he bellowed but did not get any response from Harry. Snape was seriously getting goosebumps just by watching Potter. Desperately, he searched for a way to make Potter stop dancing. Finally, he conjured up a pail of cold water and poured the contents over Harry's head.

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"ARGGHHHH!!!!!!", Harry yelled when he was rudely awoken by a bucket of ice-cold water that drenched him. His eyes shot open and he glared angrily at his surroundings, only to find Snape smirking at him.

"What did you do that for? I did not do anything to you! Is this your idea of a joke? I was having a very pleasant dream, mind you! Now if you would excuse me, I would like to return back to my dream, _sir_", Harry told him off angrily before stalking to the bathroom to dry himself up.

As he was walking away, he could have sworn that he heard Snape mutter darkly, "Believe me, I know all about your dream".

'What's that supposed to mean?', he wondered to himself before deciding that he did not care, for Snape was an annoying nutter who probably did all that just for the hell of it.


	4. Snape's birthday

A/N: Hope the story isn't too slow paced. Enjoy!

'Thoughts'

"Speech"

* * *

Snape's birthday

Snape sat bolt upright at 5 on the dot. He went to the bathroom, trying his best to forget what he had witnessed yesterday night. After washing his face, he stared at the mirror.

That was when he noticed the scar staring back at him, looking so prominent on his forehead that it was as if though it had somehow been stamped onto his forehead. He had not noticed previously as he had been too busy. He felt slightly troubled at all the stupid emotions that he felt within him.

This had been a confusing couple of days for him. He was supposed to hate Potter, but it was kind of impossible to hate Potter when he was trapped in his body.

It was as weird as…hating a mirror image of himself. He growled in frustration.

It is not as if though Snape did not hate how he looked. Don't get him wrong, he was not an egotistical bastard, not like that James and Sirius. He had hated how he looked for every single day when he was young. Detested his hooked nose, high cheekbones, scrawny body, almost everything about his physical appearance that had caused him to be the butt of jokes. But he had many years to get use to his looks. Now, when he looked at himself (his original body of course, not Potter's body), he would just observe himself with a slight distaste. Therefore, he could not bring himself to hate Potter. It was simply too strange.

'But did that mean that he forgave him?'

"Ugh quite being such a wimp, get to work!", he told himself sternly. He went back to his unfinished stack of scrolls that were waiting to be marked, the stack that he had conveniently abandoned when he got distracted by Potter. Today however, Potter woke up earlier than the previous day. When he returned from the bathroom, he greeted Severus with a cheerful "Good morning!". Snape grudgingly replied back.

"Professor? I wanted to ask you if you could teach me more about what I was going to be teaching your classes today", he heard Potter telling him with a careful tone in his voice, as if he was afraid that Snape would yell at him.

Well well, who knew that Potter could be so serious about teaching? Despite himself, Severus had been worrying what Dumbledore would say if he found that the grades of his students drastically dropped. Alright then, Potter could not say that he forced him to do this. Snape magically put away the stack of scrolls neatly in a pile before he took out his potions textbook.

He spread it out on the table and signaled for Potter to sit next to him. Potter _'Accioed' _a chair nearby and settled himself comfortably on it.

"See here, when you are teaching this chapter, you have to tell the students to take note of the extra counter clockwise turn they must make when the potion appears to have settled down…", Snape started in a lecturing tone. He was amazed that Potter was actually paying attention to what he was saying. It was so unlike him to pay attention during Potions. He could always tell that Potter was always daydreaming in class; if not for Granger, he probably would not even have made it to 6th year potions.

He knew everything regarding the topics that Potter was supposed to teach his class today, of course. Thus, he could lecture Potter even when he was not using his full concentration. Pretty soon, he forgot about his amazement and got absorbed into the world of Potions together with Harry.

* * *

The days flew by, with the two of them falling into almost the same routine. Harry had taken great pleasure finding excuses to call Snape for detention. After all, if he did not find excuses, how were they able to justify why Snape was spending almost everyday in his room? Snape had to face the 'horrors' of sleeping in a Gryffindor dormitory and after a while he got used to it. However, not surprisingly, he still preferred to sleep in his own room. 

Professor McGonagall had finally managed to catch wind of the fact that "Harry" was serving detention with Professor Snape, resulting in "Harry" having to face the wrath of her fury.

Harry could still remember the unforgettable afternoon when he heard Professor McGonagall's screech echo all around the Gryffindor Tower. Sadly, he had to face a disgruntled Snape when he returned. Snape, whose temper had originally been bad, had never, in Harry's opinion, been in a worst temper before that. He cringed just at the thought of facing another evening such as that one.

But that 'small incident' aside, detentions were actually a good time for them to get to know each other better. Oddly, Snape always seemed more open and willing to share facts about himself during the 'detentions' than usual.

There was also an unexpected piece of news that he had heard from Snape. He recalled with a faint smile on his face, the image of Snape with eyes that shone with happiness.

That was in fact, the first time Harry had ever seen Snape looking joyful. He knew that Snape was not celebrating because he felt happy for Harry's best friends, but because it meant that he had more time for himself without them questioning or badgering him.

There was one incident that took the cake, however. He had been walking towards his next classroom for yet another class that he had to teach, when he spotted the sight of Snape getting cornered by all the Slytherins. Of course, the Slytherins had no idea that they were actually cornering Snape, their dear teacher.

Harry soon discovered that Snape did not take lightly to being cornered. Seconds later, he saw Snape with a wand in his hand, the Slytherins all lying on the floor with strange looking boils and warts all over their body. They were all unconscious. Even though that incident had happened quite a few months ago, he still laughed out loud whenever he recollected that particular scene.

As for Harry, he quickly noticed that Snape did not really have many friends. Apart from Malfoy disturbing him from time to time, as well as the other Slytherins that were always trying to vie for his attention, he was really quite lonely.

The only friend that he had for now was Snape, if he could be counted as a friend. His, should he call it friendship, acquaintance with Snape was really unusual. They were mostly maintaining the relation of Professor and student, but had the unique relation of friends during rare times, many of which included those 'detentions'. They hardly quarreled nowadays, which was a good thing he supposed.

In the blink of an eye, it was the last day of the school term. Harry was walking towards the Great Hall when he overheard Ron asking Snape about his holidays plans. He felt mortified at the idea of Snape spending the holidays at the burrow.

He was willing to bet his life that Snape was no more willing to go to the burrow than he was of Snape spending the holidays there. He held his breath in anticipation, waiting for Snape's reply. Thankfully, Snape answered Ron with something along the lines of "It's ok, I would spend my holidays in Hogwarts". He was not really sure because he had been so nervous.

That evening, Harry was with Snape as usual in the dungeons. Finally, unable to withstand the curiosity that he felt, he burst out, "Professor, are you going to stay at Hogwarts?". He regretted his outburst immediately. Heck, now he had just given another opportunity to Snape to mock him.

Thankfully, Snape took no notice of his embarrassment and replied, "Unfortunately yes, I guess you are too" in a curt voice.

* * *

Severus was trying his best to appear nonchalant, all the while fighting an internal battle within himself. Since when had he cared whether Potter stayed in Hogwarts for Christmas? At that point in time, he had no choice but to admit to himself that he was slowly but surely becoming friends with Potter. 

As if to prove his point, he somehow became more cheerful when he realized that Potter was staying for the holidays. Nonetheless, he chose to ignore that disturbing thought and pushed it to the back of his mind.

Snape found himself waving goodbye to Potter's friends. Ah, the holidays all to himself. Suddenly, he felt very laid-back. He could immerse himself in the world of Potions and nobody would be there to bother him. No one except Potter, that is.

Now that he no longer had to attend lessons or mark scripts, he found himself a little disorientated. It took him a few days to get use to some odd new 'schedule' that he planned for himself.

Nowadays, he spent almost his whole day poring over the books in the library, learning more about potions. That was his favourite subject. Used to be, is currently his favourite and always will be his favourite. The reason was simple. It required discipline and one to be organized, which was what he was. It was always reliable; as long as you followed the instructions as to how to brew a potion, you could never grow wrong. After that, he would spend the rest of his evening cooped up in his dungeons

Snape was not the only one feeling lost either. Unknown to him, Harry was feeling just as helpless. This had got to be the first year he spent at Hogwarts alone, with the exception of Snape. It also had to be the first year ever to spend the holidays in another body. Poor unsuspecting Snape also did not know that Harry had found out how he created that passageway into his room from the wall of the dungeons.

_"Aparecium",_ he mimicked Snape. Instantly, the wall shone with some incoherent inscription. He went through the wall and snuck into the Snape's room.

He felt kind of guilty for snooping around in Snape's room, but then he was just simply so bored. This was how he spent most of his mornings. He always had a nice long chat with Gaza, looking around the room, trying to discover new things. He was always careful though. Wouldn't want Snape to blow his top now, would he?

Suddenly, Harry had a great idea. He started waving his wand around, all over muttering the charm to reveal any invincible inscriptions or things. Suddenly, a box that had not been present previously appeared in his view.

The box was such a deep shade of blue that it appeared black to him at first glance. Curiously, he opened the box. He saw a pale green book. Naturally, of course, he opened it. He saw Snape's handwriting in a neat, computerized sort of way.

After scanning through the book, he concluded that it was some weird potions collection book. How boring, he thought dejectedly before flipping to the last page. His hand froze in mid-action of closing the book, as he had just seen what looked like Snape's biodata. It looked something like this:

* * *

**_Name: Severus Snape_**

**_Birthday: 15th December_**

**_Enjoys: Staying away from trouble.Potions? Defence against the dark arts._**

* * *

****

Hmm, he thought with interest.

'Snape's birthday was on 15th of December? Why, that was 4 days from now!'

Judging from the handwriting, Snape must have been quite young. Who knew that Snape had interest in Potions and Defence against the dark arts even when he was young? He placed the book back into the box and hoped that the box would mysteriously disappear from sight.

'Okay, now he had a birthday present to hunt for', he thought with satisfaction at the prospect of having a mission to complete.

* * *

Snape could feel that something was…different. Potter was unusually cheerful today. Normally he was just listlessly walking around the room, talking to Gaza and occasionally talking to Snape. Out of the blue, Potter asked him, "Snape, can I ask you something?". 

Snape wondered to himself, 'Since when did he call me Snape?', but paid no heed to it. He felt interested in what Potter had to question him about, so he nodded his head in approval.

"Have you always known what you wanted to be when you grew up? Did you decide that you were going to be a Potions master when you left Hogwarts?".

Now what was up with that boy? What had gotten him so riled up and uncertain about his own future to start and question others? Snape felt that it was a touchy subject, but he knew that he could always end the conversation anytime he wanted.

"I…I did like Potions since my younger days, didn't really think much about my future", he answered vaguely.

"Then what do you think I can do next time? Do you think I should be a professional Quidditch player or something?", he heard Potter questioning him.

He was rather irritated by now. How the hell was he supposed to know what Potter should be? He pretty much told Potter what he felt, only in a slightly more polite way. Potter looked slightly demoralized before he went to the bathroom. Snape felt strangely affected by his slightly demoralized look, knowing that he was the one who put it there on his face.

"Ugh Severus, get a grip. Stop acting like a girl", he lectured himself. Potter wished him goodnight as usual, before taking his place on the couch.

* * *

The days went by swiftly. However, he found this holidays oddly fulfilling. Usually, his holidays comprised of him staying alone at the Snape Mansion, poring over the huge supply of books that he had. He was always buying new books to add to his "Potions" collection. After all, the more the merrier, right? But he had always felt very lonely in that house. You would think that by living many years in isolation, one would get use to the loneliness; however Snape just proved the theory wrong. 

'Get your head out of the gutter, Snape', he had to remind himself yet again. Since last month, he had had to constantly remind himself almost all the time.

"To make sure that the potion remains thick, remember to add 1 spoonful of dandelion powder once every hour…". The world that potions had to offer was so much more interesting as compared to his sad and pathetic life.

He checked the time using the_ "Tempus"_ charm [A/N: refer back to chapter 2 if you have forgotten. It was still early. He had a sudden urge to take a bath (he swore that Potter's obsession with cleanliness was catching up on him).

Upon reaching his room, he took out a fresh set of Potter's robes and prepared for a nice bubble bath.(Hey, even the most menacing characters needed a bubble bathe sometimes!)

He did not really bother to smell what kind of soap he was using, for he was kind of absent mindedly pouring a capful of it into his bathtub, while the water was running. He stepped into the warm bath, feeling pleasantly refreshed. He could soak for hours in baths like these.

He was now horribly aware that this was the first time that he was actually bathing Potter's body. For the past 3 weeks he had been muttering cleansing charms on himself because he simply did not have the luxury for a shower or because he simply could not be bothered to do so.

Potter's hair was shorter than his was, but seemed to be in quite a tangled mess. He scrubbed Potter's body not too thoroughly and carried on soaking in the bathe. When he felt as if though he was going to fall asleep, he reluctantly wiped himself dry and cleaned up the remaining soap bubbles in the tub.

"Ought to do something with that horrid hair of yours, looks as if though cockroaches had chosen it as their new home", his mirror quipped. He felt very annoyed by that mirror. Soon, he was going to get rid of that unpleasant mirror.

'Wait…it was commenting on 'Potter's hair', not his! Why did he get so agitated for? Normally when the mirror commented about his looks, it was so easy for him to ignore.Argh!' That bath did not help him to clear his thoughts; it just made him more confused.

Never mind, since it was nearly 5, (which was the usual time that Severus and Potter met outside the dungeons room), he decided to step outside and wait for him.

He was astounded to see a piece of parchment stuck on his door. Written in what was definitely Potter's handwriting, was an invitation for Snape to meet Potter in the Quidditch pitch.

'What was that boy up to now?', he wondered to himself and headed there out of curiosity. He reached there to see Potter grinning at him, hovering on a broomstick, all ready to fly.

"Well what are you waiting for? Get on that broomstick!", he heard Potter yelling at him faintly, most of his voice lost in the wind. He turned to where Potter was gesturing at and could roughly make out that there was a cleansweep not too far away on the grass, just waiting to be mounted on.

He was amazed at what Potter could do when he was determined. It seemed that not even the lack of a broom could stop Potter from carrying out his plans, whatever they were.

Snape wrinkled his nose in distaste.

'What a sorry looking cleansweep!' His Nimbus, although a little battered, still looked far more presentable than that cleansweep.

'Oh well, beggars can't be choosers.' He did not think it was fair to refuse Potter, when he had obviously gone through the trouble of stealing that broomstick from the broom cupboard.

He walked calmly up to the cleansweep and was up in the air in seconds. Harry smiled brilliantly at him.

"Let's race to the end of the pitch! Ok, one, two….three!", Potter cried out and sped off eagerly without waiting for a reply from Snape. Snape felt a little taken aback by this sudden declaration, but zoomed after Potter on his broomstick nonetheless.

Well, a little excitement could do him no harm right? After all, this was the holidays. It was not everyday that someone challenged him to a race on a broomstick and certainly not everyday that he had the time to fly on a broomstick.

* * *

The wind roared in his ears. Harry felt such satisfaction flying on his broomstick, feeling as though he had left the world behind. The broom did not even feel uncomfortable at all. Despite it being an old cleansweep as well (Harry did not want Snape to complain that he won the race because he had a better broom), Harry so comfortable on the broom that it was as if though he was seated on a soft armchair. The wonders that charms could do! 

After flying for a while, he turned behind to see Snape flying at break neck speed towards him, eyes glittered with determination.

It still felt kind of strange to see himself looking back at him sometimes and this happened to be one of such times. It was not everyday that he saw himself zooming towards him (Harry's body zooming towards Harry). Now that he thought about it, this was the first time that he was flying with a body other than his own.

Although Snape's body was not muscular, overall it was still quite adapted to flying. Snape's body was generally quite thin, therefore making it easy for Harry to flatten it against the broomstick. This made Harry have the ability to fly on his broomstick at quite a fast pace without the wind resisting too much of his movement. Soon, Harry and Snape were racing alongside each other. He felt adrenaline surge through his veins. They were nearing the finish line. Both put in an extra burst of energy, speeding towards the finish line for all they were worth. In the end, they tied.

"Up for another match, Snape?", he teased Snape. Snape was panting slightly and looked a little pale.

"In case you haven't notice, I have not ridden on a broomstick for almost 15 years. I have no wish to die of heart failure yet", he heard Snape complaining.

He had to admit, he was rather impressed at that revelation. He had not realized before that that Snape had not ridden on a broomstick for so long. He thought that Snape was doing so all this years, but perhaps when he assumed it was safe to do so without the risk of discovery. However, he refused to let Snape see that he was impressed against his will.

"It's getting dark, let's go back", he said quickly, trying to change the subject. He descended gradually, landing gracefully. Snape soon followed suit.

"I…I will keep the broomsticks. See you in the Hall at 7 ", he said, thinking quickly for an excuse to allow him to vanish from Snape's sight for a while. He had something to do.

* * *

Snape had to admit that it felt rather exhilarating to be on a broomstick after so many years. His skills were a little rusty from lack of use, but he was still capable of flying properly. Hell, he was willing to bet that if Potter hadn't had a head start, he would have beaten Potter. 

He strolled towards the lake. Strangely, he fancied a walk around the lake. He had not looked at the lake for such a long time. It always made him remember James, as it was the place that James had always hung around, ruffling up his hair and flirting with the girls.

He heard a splash coming from the lake and looked up just in time to see a large tentacle rise from the surface of the water. Yep, that had to be the Giant Squid.

Snape remembered how he used to come to this lake whenever he had troubles. He would hide behind a tree (in case James and his _lovely_ gang came along and decided to hex him), staring out into the lake. Occasionally, he would spot a tentacle or two emerging from the water. As a young boy he had been awed by the sight, but now that he had grown up and had grown accustomed to strange sights and occurrences, it no longer made him gasp in awe at its beauty.

Golden sunlight reflected off the surface of the water. He looked at the sun and saw it in all its glory, disappearing behind the clouds in a sea of liquid gold. It really was getting dark. Snape started to head towards the Hall for dinner.

As he entered the Hall, he saw that it was decorated differently. The Hall was bathed in whitish glow, almost as if there were snow in the Hall itself. The usual candles that were floating in the Hall were now purple in colour instead of yellowish white.

He felt his eyes widen slightly in astonishment when he caught sight of Potter, not too far away, with a cake in front of him and a silly grin on his face. How could he have forgotten his own birthday? Snape wanted to bang his head against the wall for his ignorance. He had been too preoccupied to even remember his own birthday. He tried to keep his expression calm as he walked towards Potter.

"Happy Birthday, Snape!" Snape was too puzzled at how Potter knew his birthday to notice that Potter had once again called him without addressing him as 'Professor'.

"But how did you know…", he started to ask Potter. Potter just gave him a mysterious smile and told him he had 'his ways'. Snape knew that it was hopeless trying to make the boy try to admit and had this feeling that he did not want to know how Potter knew anyway, so he left it at that.

"Congratulations, Snape, you are one year older!", Harry said while beaming at him. This time, Snape noticed that Potter did not address him with formalities.

'Oh never mind, it does seem quite silly for him to be calling me as a Professor when there is only the two of us here', he thought dismissively to himself. Harry then proceeded on to sing the birthday song for Snape and even asked Snape to make a wish.

At that point, an embarrassed Snape told him quite curtly that Severus Snape never makes wishes and that they were only for small children, before he blew out the candles in one puff before Potter could protest.

Potter shrugged in defeat before he vanished the candles from the cake, after which he handed Snape a light purple cake knife. Snape felt mildly irritated that he had to do something as silly as cutting a cake, when he obviously had a wand to do the job. He mentioned that to Potter in a rather terse tone, but Potter insisted that it was a 'birthday tradition' to do so.

Snape took the knife and jabbed it into the cake once, stubbornly refusing to cut the cake. Potter sighed in defeat, muttering something along the lines of "At least stubborn old Snape cut the cake once" before proceeding on to cut it himself.

When they had had their fill, the cake magically vanished. Snape was about to ask Potter to go back to the dungeons when Potter whipped out a box that was gift-wrapped, obviously meant for Snape as a birthday present.

He could not help but feel slightly touched at this gesture. After all, nobody had given him a birthday present for a very long time. Snape looked at Potter suspiciously, half expecting Potter to start laughing and saying "Gotcha!". Looking at Potter's expectant face, Snape accepted the present with a barely audible "thanks". It was not his style to thank people. Never was used to it, probably never would get used to it.

He peeled open the wrapper to reveal a beater's club inside the box, with a bow tied round the diameter of the club.

"You like it?", Potter asked him tentatively. He nodded tensely, deliberately keeping a blank expression on his face. He did not want to let Potter see that he was happy to receive it. Anyway, it was easier having a blank expression on his face than to smile.

He cleared his throat a little uncertainly before he said, "you might want to know, I'm not used to this... birthday kind of thing."

Snape stood up and waited for Potter to follow behind him.

* * *


	5. Their day at muggletown

**A/N: Thank you reviewers for giving me the motivation to continue writing! Now lets get on with the story, shall we?**

'Thoughts'

"Speech"

_Spells, emphasis_

* * *

Their day at muggletown

Harry knew that Snape would not have any reaction to his present, though he still could not refrain himself from feeling a little disheartened. Never mind, he told himself dismissively before he followed Snape silently back to Snape's room.

He wondered vaguely when Dumbledore was coming back. He hoped he came back soon. You could hardly blame him from preferring his own body, right? Who would not be more comfortable in their own skin?

When they reached Snape's room, Harry immediately went to talk to Gaza. Gaza was quite a good listener actually. She was also rather wise, a fact that Harry had discovered not long after he knew her. Before long, they were chatting happily. He was hissing happily to her, telling her all about Snape's birthday.

Moments later, he went to Snape and reported cheekily that Gaza wished him a happy birthday as well, before moving towards the couch, leaving Snape staring at him in what seemed to be a mix of shock and horror. Needless to say, after all the hectic activities that he had gone through throughout the day, he was thoroughly exhausted and fell asleep almost immediately.

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Once again, the holidays were becoming a bore to Harry.

Luckily it was Christmas. He expected that by the time school reopened again in January, Dumbledore would be back again to help them to solve their 'problem'.

With that thought in his head, he instantly became more cheerful. As he was becoming more restless by the minute, Harry finally decided to take a stroll around the Gryffindor Tower. Honestly, he had not been to the Gryffindor Tower much since his 'transformation' .It would only bring unnecessary attention, thus he avoided going there at all costs.

Everything was pretty much the same. He was just thinking about some past recollections when Snape suddenly tapped him hard on the shoulder, causing him to be startled out of his thoughts. He sent an evil glare in Snape's direction. Sadly, Snape appeared to be immune to such looks.

"Er, I am going to make a trip down to muggletown (what an innovative name, lol) to get some ingredients that are only available at this time of the year, for some potions."

"But Snape, I'll be left all alone at Hogwarts", Harry said somewhat lamely.

"Not afraid of ghosts or scary fairies that will spirit you away, are you?", he snickered as he teased Harry. Harry looked at him furiously before he continued smoothly, " I suppose you have to come with me, otherwise Dumbledore would kill me if he found out?".

Harry's heart skipped a beat. Hell, he nearly jumped for joy at the opportunity to leave the boring castle, but did not do so as he was not about to let Snape see how delighted he was to go to that strange place.

Hastily, he followed Snape closely, in case Snape chose to leave him behind, or to "accidentally" lose him. Upon reaching Snape's room, he saw that Snape had taken out a handful of floo powder and was preparing to travel via floo network.

"Well, grab a handful of floo powder, say 'muggletown' and go!", Snape said mockingly, taking on the tone that one might have when talking to a three year old. Harry took a huge handful of floo powder and did as instructed. The last thing he saw was Snape smirking at him before he reached his destination.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

He blinked in surprise when he realized that there was an eerie silence in the room that he was in.

However, on the outside, he could tell that the place was very lively and filled with hustle and bustle.

'Hah, trust Snape to find this kind of dodgy room even at the most lively of places', he thought to himself in mild amusement.

Glancing at the fireplace at which he had just emerged from, he realized that it was trembling slightly- a sign that another person was on the way. That jerked him out of his thoughts and he quickly remembered that Snape was coming right behind him. He swiftly went to stand away from the fireplace so that Snape would not collide into him when he arrived.

Just as he was horribly aware that he had soot all over Snape's robes, Snape came into view.

Snape appeared unfazed, looking as though he had merely walked and arrived right at the spot he was standing on. He surveyed his own robes and Harry's robes with mild disgust before muttering a spell that promptly removed all the soot from both of their robes. Harry made a mental note to ask Snape to teach him that spell.

When Snape opened the door which led to muggletown, Harry could not help but gape at the beautiful sight. The town was very unusual indeed, its shape being more like a huge square than an endless row of shops. Stalls littered the sides of the square. The stalls had tents that were very colourful : red and green, gold and red; mostly all of them were decorated in Christmas colours. Colourful lights hung limply from the streetlamps, adding to the Christmasy atmosphere.

Observing carefully, he realized that the place only sold muggle items. He knew that he was not really in the muggle world though, as he could still see witches and wizards of all kinds, dressed in wizard robes and discussing about stuff that was about the wizarding world, all in a nonchalant manner.

Harry was glad for once that nobody stared at him even though he was in a crowded place. Everybody seemed to be too preoccupied with their own last minute Christmas shopping.

He was deep in his own thoughts when all of a sudden, he had an inspiration!

He glanced uncertainly at Snape, unsure if he would approve of his idea. However, he decided to risk getting thumped on the head and announced, "Snape! I have an idea! We will each, er, change a little of each others' look so that it looks somewhat different and then will meet back here at around", he glanced at his watch, "say, 4.15 p.m. How does that sound?"

To his utter surprise, Snape did not reject his idea at once. He just narrowed his eyes and said suspiciously, "meaning?", as if he had not fully understood what Harry had just said.

Harry hastily explained in a rush, "Since I am in your body and you are in my body, we can do something different for a change, since you always hated my "incorrigible" hair. and I…erm… never mind. For example, you could add a tattoo onto my body, though I would advise you not to, because it is actually quite painful. Oh and erm, we cannot do anything stupid, like me shaving your head bald or you adding a nose ring".

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Snape was once again stunned at what silly ideas Potter could think of. He had almost wanted to tell Potter exactly what he thought of his 'idea', but decided that this could be quite a good way for him to get rid of Potter, if only for a while. He knew that Potter would not dare to do anything stupid to his body; Potter knew very well that there would be dire 'consequences' if he tried. And heck, he was not going to take part in some stupid makeover. At most he would just buy some new glasses to satisfy Potter. He did hate Potter's round glasses anyway.

Finally, after weighing the pros and cons, he nodded in reply. Potter grinned at him from ear to ear.

"Uh, so we meet here then", Potter said while pointing at an extremely tall clock tower not too far away. After he nodded once again in agreement, he smirked slightly as he saw Potter practically skipping away.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Harry felt delighted when Snape had agreed. Oh, he had so much that he wanted to do. Boy was Snape in for a surprise, he thought to himself, nearly cackling in glee.

He walked around as quickly as he could, in search of the 'best' accessory that would suit Snape's features. He contemplated purchasing a pair of huge tortoiseshell sunglasses for Snape, but amidst his snickering, he decided that perhaps Snape would not even know what sunglasses were for. Anyway, it seemed as if though Snape did not like the sun too much anyway.

Then, he passed by a stall that sold all kinds of hats, ranging from serious to plain goofy. There were hats like white chef hats,comical looking hats for witches that were as tall as two feet, miniature party hats which Harry suspected were for fairies and even hats that muggles usually wore (he was unsure if they called them 'Santa Claus Hats'). Once again, Harry wanted to purchase one of these red and white hats but finally, he decided against it.

Next to that stall, he faintly made out a sign that said, "Kiss for all you are worth! $4 per person"

He scrunched up his face in disgust. There were so many people frenching; women with men, men with men, women with women…He felt a little put out by their disgusting display, however, he did feel a flicker of arousal when he looked at a particularly hot male couple kissing passionately for all they were worth. You would think that they knew each other for years, but Harry knew for a fact that most probably, they had just gotten to know each other a few minutes ago, right at this booth.

He forced himself to look away, fighting to keep his blush under control.

Suddenly, he located a stall that had a bright pink neon signboard. The words were moving, swaying in time to the Christmas carols that were sung by some choir on the street, not too far away.

He had to squint hard and finally, he deciphered that it was some strange place where they could 'alter your features for the better'. His eyes brightened considerably as he realized that this could be the place he was looking for. He walked in, grinning like a cheshire cat.

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Snape walked around, feeling increasing bored by the minute. He had gotten all the ingredients within 20 minutes, for they were not exactly in _high_ demand. Not many muggles used those ingredients to make potions after all.

'Ugh! Those irritating Christmas carols were definitely not helping'. He seriously contemplated hexing them with _Silencio _just to stop what seemed to be a headache from forming.

Just then, his eyes were inevitably drawn to a stall that sold toys for children. Well, it _was_ kind of hard to miss, it being bright neon green in colour and all. "That damn tent ought to be banned", Snape thought irritably to himself. His eyes were starting watering, courtesy of the stupid tent.

After walking for a good 20 minutes, he finally found a stall that was at least 'acceptable', by his standards. The stall had a nice black colour to it, not like all the other stupid bright tents. He peered inside and found that it was a hair salon.

"Hmm, maybe I can improve Har-Potter's horrid hair", he mused. After much deliberation, he finally decided to walk in.

"Hello sir, welcome, welcome! How can I be of assistance?", a slightly plump dwarf greeted him cheerfully.

"Just do whatever you want to fix this hair", he drawled snootily.

"Alright sir!", the dwarf replied happily before he ushered Snape to a seat. Snape tried his best not to appear nervous. The dwarf returned minutes later with a lot of fancy equipment that Snape did not recognize. He supposed that they were items used by muggles to cut hair. He scowled in displeasure. If it was one thing he hated, it was not knowing how things would turn out.

"Relax, sir", the dwarf told Snape while securing some cloth on his shoulders. Snape twitched uncomfortably but did not stop the dwarf. Then, the dwarf whipped out a pair of scissors and started to cut his hair.. He could sense that the dwarf was quite professional by the way it was cutting his hair in a systematic manner.

Slowly, Snape began to relax. The dwarf then proceeded on to wash his hair, dried it and then applied something into his hair. He assumed that it was to help tackle Potter's hair. After all, Potter did not have the 'average' type of hair. His hair appeared to be able to resist all attempts to make it neater. Snape twiddled his thumbs in impatience. The dwarf then called his boss, who waved a wand over Snape's head.

"Ok, you can look into the mirror now", the dwarf informed Snape. Snape yelped in shock. He was looking at Potter's hair in shock. It was a horrendous cheerful yellow colour. Snape's face contorted with rage as he immediately brought the dwarf responsible for his 'plight' at wand point. The dwarf spluttered in fear, trying unsuccessfully to hide behind his boss.

"Is this your idea of a joke? Change my hair into its original colour, or at least something that resembles it", Snape spat at the dwarf. The dwarf cowered in fear. Panicking slightly, the boss immediately rushed to get the necessary equipment to change his hair back.

"Eh, we have no more black left. Will brown do?", the boss asked anxiously. Well, brown was certainly better than blinding yellow, Snape thought bitterly. He could almost picture Harry flying into a rage at the sight of his new hair. Harry definitely would not take the matter of being turned into a blond (A/N: No offence!).

After applying that same weird substance, the boss hastily waved his wand over Snape's head. When Snape looked into the mirror again, he was relieved to see Potter's hair not in that horrible yellow, but in a nice russet brown.

'Hmm, actually it does not look all that bad', Snape mused. He grudgingly forked out a couple of galleons before leaving the stall. Maybe he should go find a new set of spectacles for Potter. He carried on walking around, until he found the perfect stall that sold spectacles. He walked in, smiling to himself.

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When they finally met at the clock tower, Harry could not help but let out a low whistle at the sight of his new hair and spectacles. It was a rather pleasant surprise actually, seeing yourself looking different for a change.

What finally sent Harry into whoops of laughter was the sight of Snape's face. He looked as if though he was about to fall into a dead faint due to shock. Harry simply could not stop laughing; soon he had tears streaming down his face and his sides ached, but he was still unable to stop. Snape looked very indignant and snapped at him so that he would stop embarrassing himself, but to no avail. Finally, after a good 20 minutes later, Harry finally sobered up.

"Now that you have decided to stop laughing like a hyena, would you care to tell me what did you do to my nose?", Snape asked, not even bothering to disguise his curiosity and surprise.

Harry took in a deep breath and explained that he had gone to some sort of stall that offered to do basic cosmetic surgery, but of course not in the muggle way. They muttered some charm, as though it were a war chant, for a while and then the part which you wanted to alter would be changed to your fancy. Therefore in Harry's case, he had gone down and requested to change Snape's nose.

"What makes you think that you can go round changing my body parts without my permission?" Snape snarled, feeling almost angrily.

"We agreed that we could make each other look different!", Harry reminded him proudly.

Snape acted as if though he was really pissed at Harry for doing something so stupid, but deep down he was rather pleased. He never liked his huge big nose anyway. Now it looked kind of…nice. He would no sooner run around muggletown stark naked than to admit it to Harry, though.

As they were making their way back to Hogwarts via the floo network again, Snape suddenly noticed that Harry was carrying a rather suspicious looking package. He immediately questioned Harry, but all he received was a mischievous look and a mysterious "all will be revealed in due time" from him.

'That boy was sure full of secrets', he thought silently to himself. Nevertheless, he came to the decision that Potter would not reveal anything else to him at the moment, so he did not attempt to question him, never speaking to him again until they reached Hogwarts.

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Snape did not have time to wonder about the likes of Potter because of all the potions that he had to brew. The ingredients he had just purchased were fresh; therefore it was best that he completed brewing his potions by that day itself for them to be the most effective.

He chopped up his ingredients absently (even though he could easily use a wand to assist him, chopping up ingredients personally for his potions yielded better results).

He only noticed that he was not alone when he was rudely disturbed by Potter, who was rapping on the door so hard that he ran the risk of banging the door down.

The cheeky brat was still holding his silly package. Snape could only hope that it was not a prank that was meant for him, as he grudgingly opened the door leading to the dungeons.

By now, Snape knew that he could trust Potter; besides, the hassle of meeting him outside the dungeons every time Potter wanted to retrieve something was far too annoying. He would rather take the risk of Harry coming to ransack his items in the future than to keep on going all the way to the dungeons just to let him take some spellbook or something. Therefore, he had taught Harry how to make the inscriptions appear on the wall. It was of course unknown to him that Harry had prior knowledge on how to do that exactly.

Snape ignored Potter, focusing hard on brewing his potions. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Harry walk through the wall with that package. Hmm, he would have to be careful when he reached his room, he mused. When he had finally finished, apparently satisfied with the condition of his potions, he sauntered to his room. He glanced around suspiciously, searching for anything amiss. What puzzled him was that his room was in the exact same condition as the previous night.

He was just opening his cupboards to see if any of his items had suddenly "gone missing", when Potter suddenly sprung out from the bathroom, shouting "Merry Christmas!" Snape nearly fainted from shock there and then. Sure, he had been expecting something out of the ordinary, but when he was concentrating on checking for lost items, he had let his guard down. He could see Potter smirking with glee at the sight of him looking so shocked.

When he had finally recovered from shock, he realized that he had actually gotten a Christmas present from someone. That fact in itself was almost so shocking that Snape nearly went to a state of unconsciousness for the second time in a matter of 5 minutes.

It was just that he, Severus Snape, never gave or received _Christmas_ presents from anyone for more than half a decade. (So forgive him for his state of shock okay?)

He received the present with narrowed eyes. He first checked the present for hexes, curses and charms (ignoring the protests of Harry) before opening it. When he saw what was inside, his expression changed from one of bewilderment, to a look of utter shock and embarrassment rapidly.

For the present was a _red_ pair of_ knickers_ and there was an imprint of a pussycat right at the front! He could see Potter grinning from ear to ear.

"Hey Snape, you want me to try it out so that you can see what it would look like on your body?", Potter asked suggestively. Snape was in too much of a panicked state to notice that Harry had only been joking.

At that moment, Snape turned so pale that his skin tone was actually comparable to Moaning Myrtle. The thought of Potter clad in nothing but that ridiculous looking knickers, even though he was in Snape's body caused him to be nervous to no end. It also caused some weird sensation in his stomach that he attributed to nausea.

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Harry was fighting to keep from bursting out with laughter, but what finally caused him to lose his composure was the sight of Snape looking as if though he about to suffer from a nervous breakdown.

He chortled with laughter, which soon turned into undignified snorts of laughter, all the while clutching his stomach. Tears of laughter sprung up to his eyes, so that he could no longer see Snape blushing slightly. When his stomach finally ached so much that he had to forcefully stop himself laughing (by picturing Dumbledore kissing Professor McGonagall), he felt thoroughly winded and wicked for laughing at Snape's plight.

'Laughing certainly makes a person exhausted', he thought to himself in amusement. Stealing a glance at Snape, he saw that Snape's complexion had fortunately returned to its normal state.

"For a moment there I thought that you were going to die of laughter. That would save the dark lord the trouble of killing you himself now, wouldn't it?", Snape drawled, as if he had not just been utterly embarrassed just a moment ago.

Harry could not help but sigh. 'Honestly, couldn't Snape take a joke?'

Nevertheless, Harry chose not to rise to the bait and just proceeded on to brush his teeth, ignoring Snape completely.

When he returned, he realized with shock that a queen-sized bed, which was covered in cerulean quilts, had just appeared out of nowhere. It was right next to where Snape was standing.

"Don't look at me in such a surprised manner. You did give me a Christmas present, however stupid it may be", he stated in a monotonous voice before he swept towards his own bed, leaving Harry spluttering with indignation.

'That Slimy Snape!' To think that he could have conjured up a bed for Harry right from the first night that Harry had spent in that room! And yet he only chose to conjure up a bed for Harry only at that moment. Why, Harry would have conjured his own bed in a heartbeat, if it weren't above his capabilities to do so. Stupid Snape could have saved him weeks of sleeping uncomfortably on the couch!

'He would get Snape back for that', Harry promised himself before he drifted off to sleep.

* * *


	6. Mass jog?

**A/N:As I might be busier these few weeks, I might not be able to post weekly. I'll try my best though :)**

'Thoughts'

"Speech"

* * *

Mass jog?

Dumbledore returned to Hogwarts 3 days before it opened its doors for students once more. With the help of Dumbledore, Snape and Harry exchanged bodies and were back to normal. Let's just say that he was not as surprised as he should have been to learn about their "situation", shall we? (I'm sure you can get the hint).

Before Harry knew it, it was time for school to start. As the sky began to darken, students began to arrive in the Great Hall.

Soon, the Hall was filled with the hustle and bustle of students, which surprisingly, was the noise that Harry had missed more than anything else during the holidays. After searching fruitlessly for a while, he spotted Hermione and Ron and headed towards them.

"Hey, had a great holiday?", he asked Ron cheerfully.

"Yup! But can't say the same for you, not with _him _around", Ron told Harry darkly.

Harry knew there and then that his friends were not ready to know the truth- that he was and still is friends with Snape. He could easily imagine Ron and Hermione with confusion, anger and a look of betrayal on their faces if they discovered his secret.

Therefore, Harry just let the matter past, enjoying the fact that he could finally talk to his friends without said friends deeming him as a nutter.

They walked swiftly, settled at the Gryffindor table rather quickly and started to enjoy the feast that was laid before them.

Students had polished their plates with glee, all the while catching up with their fellow friends.

A light tinkling sound was heard and the hall fell silent immediately. Dumbledore rose from his seat.

"Dear students, welcome back to Hogwarts. I have a couple of announcements to make. As some of you might know, I was not around in Hogwarts during late November until a few days ago. That was because I had decided to strengthen the bond between muggles and wizards". The hall immediately burst into chatters. Harry looked at Snape with a raised brow. Oh, so _that_ was where he was when they were so desperately trying to find him.

"As I was saying, I paid the minister of muggles a visit and he was so kind as to let me stay there as he let me learn more about the muggles. It was an interesting trip to say the least". He beamed at his students, pausing for a while before he continued.

"On a more serious note, I would like to remind you all that Voldemort is on the loose, so we are in more danger than ever". Harry resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Honestly, you would think that everyone would have gotten used to that fact by now. However, there were still people who were gasping as if though it was the first time they had heard of it.

"And in order for us to protect ourselves, we need to be in our best physical shape. Therefore, I am pleased to announce that we will have mass jogging sessions on every Tuesday and Thursday mornings", Dumbledore continued happily. Harry could not help but snigger at the thought of Dumbledore wearing an exercise outfit, all ready to go for a jog. All those who had lived in the muggle world before they came to Hogwarts were all complaining, while those who had lived in the wizarding world all of their lives simply looked around in confusion.

"We would all jog around the lake at 7.30 in the morning, with the prefects leading every house in the front. Teachers will be stationed at the side to ensure that students do not get injured. I would like to emphasize that hexing of fellow students is _not_ tolerated. I repeat, hexing of fellow students during the mass jogging session is _strictly_ not allowed. Moving on…"

Harry did not register what else Dumbledore said after that, for he chatted happily with Ron, ignoring the disapproving looks that Hermione was giving him. They talked about everything, from the Quidditch all the way to what they were up to all December.

From what he gathered, Ron and Hermione were blissfully in love. He thanked his lucky stars that they were, if not Hermione would have discovered Harry and Snape's "little stunt".

"Sleep early, students, we are all going to wake up early tomorrow!", Dumbledore said with glee before he strolled out of the Hall.

The students grudgingly stood up and went back to their common rooms.

It was then that Harry realized with a jolt that he could finally sleep in his dormitory.

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The sun had barely risen when a loud bell rang throughout Hogwarts, waking all the students up. Students were grumbling as they grudgingly woke up, staring around blearily, all still half-asleep.

The students gathered outside the Hall, not sure of what to expect.

As the door opened, they were stunned to see Dumbledore beside a large stack of shorts and coloured shirts.

"Everyone, gather round! Would the prefects from every house collect the jogging attires for your respective house?", Dumbledore informed the students cheerfully. "Just their luck that Dumbledore was a morning person", Harry thought grumpily.

After a while, all the students were dressed in coloured shirts that represented their houses. Gryffindors had shirts with a realistic-looking lion printed on top, Hufflepuff had an adorable looking badger, Ravenclaws sported shirts with a fierce eagle and Slytherins donned on shirts that had a sinister-looking snake staring at everyone, creeping quite a few people out.

"Students, I believe you are ready. Prefects, lead your respective houses to the lake!"

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Dumbledore held a whistle in his hand. Pointing his wand at his throat, he muttered "_Sonorous_" before he addressed the students again.

"When I blow this whistle, all of you will go round the lake in a clockwise direction. Please stay on the path and do not shove or push. Ok, ready….go!" , Dumbledore said before he blew on the whistle loudly.

Suddenly, sparks began to fly all around and students cried in alarm as ALL the students participated in a mass-hexing session. It seemed as if though it was a unanimous decision made by at least half the population to hex the other half.

Amidst all the confusion, Harry saw the perfect opportunity. Glancing at Snape, who was currently preoccupied with controlling the students, he could not help but smirk in amusement at what he was about to do.

He flicked his wand at Snape, muttering "_Tarantallegra_". He had to use every ounce of his self-discipline not to burst out laughing right in Snape's face, for the sight of Snape dancing The Tarantella (an Italian dance) was simply hilarious. It certainly did not help that Snape had a shocked expression on his face, which totally clashed with his dancing feet.

He blocked himself from some minor curses with ease. (After all, he had to constantly practice to ensure that he could be powerful enough to protect himself from Voldemort when the time came to face him).

"_Impedimenta_!" Dumbledore bellowed. At long last, all the students ceased in their hexing activities and just blinked at each other stupidly.

"As punishment, all students will not have any Hogsmeade visits this year…" Dumbledore carried on rattling away about all the other punishments that the students were going to face.

'Great', Harry thought dully, 'what a great way to start the school term', before he headed back to the castle.

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The sky had turned to dusk long ago and students and teachers alike had long since retreated back to their dormitories and headquarters respectively.

Snape was sitting alone in his room, unconsciously thinking about a particular black haired boy. There was no denying it; he felt a little awkward without Harry badgering him. He had grown accustomed to that boy in his room almost every single day, but now he was back to sleeping alone. As much as he hated to admit it, Harry's presence brightened his day.

He grinned, picturing Harry's windswept hair, his rosy cheeks, his impish laughter...

'Stop it!', Snape told himself in alarm. He was not about to go round thinking wistfully about Harry. No wait, scratch that previous comment. He, Severus Snape, _never ever_ missed anyone. He was doing fine on his own, thank you very much.

It would do him no good if anyone found out that he was turning soft.

When the students saw him for the first time since Hogwarts closed for the holidays, they all looked as if they could be knocked over if someone prodded them lightly on the chest. The only thing that was stopping them from commenting on his "new nose" openly was the knowledge that Snape would make their lives hell if they did anything like that. No, it would do him no good if his power to scare the students to obey and respect him was gone.

With a tremendous mental effort, he managed to steer his thoughts away from a certain Potter by dwelling on the events that had just happened that very morning. Hah, he knew that the idea that the old coot had suggested during his speech was just plain idiotic. He knew that it was bound to fail. Snape had been rather tempted to just sit back and watch Dumbledore struggle to control the students.

In fact, if not for the fact that he had just utterly embarrassed himself by some stupid curse that made him do some strange kind of dance, the "mass jog disaster" would have been rather enjoyable. Ugh, how he wished that he could oblivate the minds of those few students who had noticed him dancing for a brief period of time. A pity that part of the job requirement of being a professor was that he could not just oblivate his students at will. Of course, he had summoned a counter-curse almost immediately, but the damage was done.

Sadly, other than that "exciting" event that had happened in the morning, the day was pretty much normal. Lessons still continued, though they were slightly delayed as all the students had to report to the Hospital Wing to check if they were well.

Snape felt himself getting drowsy. He swiftly changed his robes to new ones, before muttering "nox", causing the lights in his room to be extinguished.

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**I'm looking forward to writing the next chapter: What the hell? **

**Can't wait to feature an extremely embarrassed Snape!**

**Please review!**


	7. What the hell?

A/N: I would like to apologize for some coarse language. If you don't like, don't read. Oh and by the way, I'm too attached to Fred and George to accept that they have left school by the time Harry is in his 7th year, so for this fic, they are still studying at Hogwarts. Just pretend that they have to repeat their NEWTs or something...

Oh yeah, I also edited the story a little so that you guys would understand how the students turned into something-that-I-would-not-mention-in-this-author's-note-because-it-would-ruin-the-story. Thank you _DreamsReality_ for helping me to improve the chapter:)

'Thoughts'

"Speech"

_Spells, emphasis_

* * *

What the hell?

It had been one whole month since the disastrous 'mass jog incident'. Thankfully, Snape never did find out that Harry was the one who hexed him.

Lessons pretty much went on as usual for Harry. Well, the only difference was the horrendous amount of homework that they were expected to complete. After all, it was the year that they were supposed to take their NEWTs.

All the teachers simply_ enjoyed_ reminding them over and over again that their NEWTs result would affect their future, that their NEWTs results were_ very_ important. Naturally, that kept all the students, including Harry, on tenterhooks almost all the time.

However, Dumbledore (the silly old coot) decided that the students were too stressed and needed a break.

His eyes were twinkling even more than usual as he whispered out, "_transformo luteolus deliciae_" while waving his wand in a triangular motion.

And now, let the "fun" begin…

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"Oh my gosh! Ahhhh!"

Harry awoke to yells that were piercingly loud, that were coming from his dormitory. He winced at the sound, sore at the fact that he was so rudely awoken. He had been in a rather pleasant dream, mind you, one that featured him playing for Puddlemere United, when he was awoken quite unpleasantly.

'What now,' he thought grumpily to himself.

He was rather shocked to see something huge and yellow running around the dormitory.

Upon closer inspection, he discovered that it was triangular-shaped and appeared to be the one making all the noise. Hmm…what kind of strange creature was that? It looked like nothing he had ever seen before.

With a jolt, he realized that he could see clearly without his glasses. That only added to his confusion.

"Wha-", he muttered in an undertone, thinking that he was still in a dream.

It took him a while to realize that the triangular thing had Ron's voice, but when he finally did, his eyes widened in surprise.

"Harry! Where are you? We've all been turned into yellow things!", the thing with Ron's voice said fearfully.

Wait…Yellow things?

"Ron…I'm here!", Harry faced Ron, trying not to laugh. This dream was getting preposterous!

"Harry, since when was your hair brown?" Ron asked him suspiciously.

Harry resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Obviously Ron did not notice that Snape had helped him to dye his hair. Erm hello, it's been ONE WHOLE MONTH?!? However, he prevented himself from voicing out that thought aloud. Instead, he just told Ron_ patiently _that his hair had been like that since the start of the year. Ron looked mildly surprised and possibly even guilty (Harry could not really tell- it was kind of hard to tell what a person was feeling without being able to see facial expressions). With that settled, Harry went back to thinking about the crisis at hand.

Wanting desperately to believe that it was a horrible joke, he went to the mirror to check, hoping against hope that his own reflection was still normal. Sadly, he realized that he too, was a yellow triangular thing.

"Holy shit!", he cursed. This must be somebody's idea of a prank- somebody must have added something in their food that caused them to turn into this….this horrendous thing! Just then, his other dorm mates had woken up.

Despite himself, he found the situation rather comical, for Ron still had his flaming red hair even though he had transformed into the yellow thing. (Honestly, the hair clashed horribly with yellow).

"This must be Fred and George's doing!" Ron exclaimed angrily before he stormed out of the dormitory to look for said twins. Feeling curious and a little outraged at this "little prank", Harry, Neville, Seamus and Dean followed suit.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

When they reached Fred and George's dormitory, they were shocked to see a long queue of yellow things banging on their door, demanding to see the mischievous twins. But what astounded them even more was the sight of two canary-coloured things coming out of the room, both sporting what was undeniably the trademark Weasley flaming red hair.

O…K…, Harry was now convinced that it was not their doing. So who the hell was responsible for all the students' mutation?

"What is all this commotion about?", Professor McGonagall demanded as she walked towards the huge crowd. She let out an involuntary gasp when she realized that they were students.

"Oh dear…", she exclaimed as soon as she realized that they were actually Gryffindors.

Being the ever experienced professor that she was, she quickly came to a decision.

"I'll go and inform the headmaster, everyone gather in the Hall. Prefects, check if the students in the other houses have the same problem…if so, ask them to head towards the hall as well…", she informed all her distraught students. Harry glanced up just in time to see Ron and Hermione (he guessed it was her because of her bushy brown hair) walking briskly towards the Ravenclaw tower.

Not wanting to be left standing alone outside Fred and George's dormitory, he shuffled along with the other students towards the Hall. Moments later, he spotted Dumbledore smiling cheerfully at the students, beckoning them to join their respective tables.

"Sheesh, doesn't that old man _ever _feel tired in the morning? It's 6.30 for god's sake", he grumbled to himself. Other students also appeared to be extremely discontented that they were being deprived of their precious sleep.

Dumbledore cleared his throat before he addressed the students.

"Good morning, fellow students! It seems we have a slight problem here-"

"_Slight_ problem indeed!", Seamus told the rest of the Gryffindors in a loud carrying whisper.

"It appears that you have all turned into lemon drops. Not to worry, the effects will be gone by the end of the day. Lessons will proceed on as usual. Good day!", he informed the students of Hogwarts cheerfully before leaving the Hall.

"That old man must have lost his marbles!", Dean complained to anyone within earshot. Harry could not help but agree with him. This was without a doubt, the works of their _dear_ headmaster. (A/N: Oh I just love starring Dumbledore as a senile old coot. Lol.)

Surprisingly, once all the commotion had died down, people actually went on to their lessons as usual. Naturally, there were a few lessons that the students could not take part in (namely Quidditch, try getting huge lemondrops to stay put on brooms!). Thankfully, they were not sticky, so they did not attract any ants or bees. That was the only good point out of this whole strange day.

It was 7 in the evening when they finally changed back to their usual selves. Everyone was extremely relieved to see that their clothes were still intact and not destroyed by their weird transformation earlier on in the day. Even Harry's spectacles miraculously appeared on his face, completely unharmed and in one piece.

As he sat down with Hermione and Ron during dinner, Hermione suddenly commented, "Your glasses changed! They became more…rectangular"

Once again, Harry resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Honestly, first Ron, then Hermione? He knew that Ron was not the most observant person, but Hermione _usually _was. That was, until she became blissfully in love. Geez, love really made a person blind, doesn't it?

He decided to just leave her wondering about his glasses, for he did not want to go on for hours about a debate regarding the severe plunge of her level of observance. Instead, he opted to pay Snape a surprise visit. He had not been to Snape's room since they had exchanged bodies back. Come to think of it, he did miss Snape's presence from time to time, especially so when the "lovebirds" were preoccupied. It was then that he felt lonely.

With that thought in his head, he ignored Hermione protest's of him not eating enough and started to make his way to the dungeons.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Snape was lonely. It was as simple as that. Poring over his precious potions books did not even help ease those horrid feelings that Snape was not supposed to feel. He tried his best to convince himself otherwise, but clearly, he was fighting a losing battle. For days like this, Snape usually had only one solution - listening to his CD player.

Snape could not help but feel a swell of pride at the sight of said CD player. It was one of the few precious possessions that he owned, not forgetting Gaza, of course.

He had bought it several years ago at muggletown. At that time, he thought that it was kind of intriguing. Who knew that it would become one of his most precious sources of comfort? Of course, a CD player required CDs, so he had bought himself several CDs as well.

He hated to admit it, but muggle music had much more appeal to him than music in the wizarding world. Who gave a damn about the silly songs that the Weird Sisters sang? Anyway, there were only a limited number of singers who were popular in the wizarding world, all of which were not to Snape's liking.

Snape placed a CD into his CD player gently before hitting the "play" button (What, surely you didn't think that he was not smart enough to find a way round the lack of electricity in Hogwarts now, did you?). The track, "Cupid's Chokehold" immediately started to boom from his player.

He allowed himself to sink into a comfortable brown armchair, soaking in the music completely.

He could feel himself getting relaxed already.

_**It's been awhile since we talked last and I'm tryin' hard not to talk fast**_

_**But dad I'm finally thinkin' I may have found the one**_

_**Type of girl that will make you way proud of your son**_

He wondered vaguely how the person who wrote the song must be feeling- blissfully in love, no doubt. It sounded like the writer was some lovesick fool that was drooling over some silly girl. What was so attractive about girls anyway? They were so emotional…so weak. They acted odd almost all the time; sometimes laughing when it was not even funny, crying for no apparent reason, getting offended over the most trivial things…

_**And I know you heard the last song about the girls that didn't last long**_

_**But I promise this is on a whole new plane**_

_**I can tell by the way she says my name (ba ba da da)**_

_**I love it when she calls my phone**_

_**She even got her very own ringtone**_

_**If that ain't love then I don't know what love is (ba ba da da)**_

'Hah! Yeah right…', Snape thought cynically to himself.

_**It's gonna be a long drive home but I know as soon as I arrive home**_

_**And I open the door take off my coat and throw my bag on the floor**_

_**She'll be back into my arms once more for sure**_

_**Take a look at my girlfriend**_

_**She's the only one I got (ba ba da da)**_

_**Not much of a girlfriend**_

_**I never seem to get a lot (ba ba da da, ba ba da da)**_

_**She's got a smile that would make the most senile**_

_**Annoying old man bite his tongue**_

_**I'm not done**_

_**She's got eyes comparable to sunrise**_

_**And it doesn't stop there**_

_**Man I swear**_

_**She's got porcelain skin of course she's a ten**_

_**And now she's even got her own song**_

_**But movin' on**_

_**She's got the cutest laugh I ever heard**_

_**And we can be on the phone for three hours**_

_**Not sayin' one word**_

_**And I would still cherish every moment**_

_**And when I start to build my future she's the main component**_

_**Call it dumb call it luck call it love or whatever you call it but**_

_**Everywhere I go I keep her picture in my wallet like here…**_

Suddenly, an image of Harry popped into his mind.

Harry with a bright smile on his face, a mischievous glint in his eyes…

Harry with his carefree laughter…

Great, just what he needed, another reminder that Harry was not with him.

'Stop wallowing in self-pity! You, of all people, do not need a…Potter by your side', he chided himself before turning up the volume even louder.

He closed his eyes and started to sing the song, along with the man that he had mentally called a lovesick fool just a moment ago. He even started swaying on his armchair.

Just then, he heard someone let out a gasp.

"S-Snape? What the hell?", the ever so eloquent Harry stuttered, to Snape's utter dismay.

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What can I say? I simply love tormenting Snape. It's so much fun. evil laugh

[A/N: Song- Cupid's Chokehold by Gym Class Heroes. I know that Fanfict does not really allow people to copy and paste other people's song lyrics, so that is why I just added _part_ of the song to the chapter. And hey, I acknowledged the people who sang it...It's not as if I'm going to start selling the song lyrics to other people.


	8. Quidditch match by the window

'Thoughts'

"Speech"

_Spells, emphasis_

* * *

Quidditch match by the window

"S-Snape? What the hell?"

Harry was rooted on the spot, with his eyes bulging slightly from shock. He opened his mouth to speak, but could only stutter and mutter incoherent words.

'It's official. I'm not going to make it out of his room alive', Harry panicked.

There was no way that Snape was going to let him live, not after what Harry had seen. There was no way that Snape would risk letting him jeopardize his reputation as the most fearsome Professor. Even though they were friends, Snape, to a certain extent, still did not trust him. He could sense it.

Gulping audibly, he slowly backed away from the Professor, unsure of what he would do. When his mind had gotten over the shock, he noticed that Snape was BLUSHING. Honestly, Harry had never seen him turn such a deep shade of red. It looked as if Snape was in the danger of setting himself aflame.

"You…" Snape seemed to struggle with his emotions before he continued, "Swear that you will not mention what you have seen to anyone or anything! Swear…Swear it on your mother's name!", Snape snarled.

Harry noticed dimly that Snape had _actually _fumbled over his words. Out of all the years that he had known him, he had never encountered a situation when Snape tripped over his own words.

'Wow, he must really be angry', Harry thought fearfully, mistaking Snape's extreme embarrassment for anger. Not really having much of a choice, he swore on his dear mother's grave. As soon as he had done that, some strange whitish glow formed a bond between Snape and him, but soon disappeared as quickly as it had appeared.

"Why, pray tell, have you decided to drop by today?", Snape asked Harry suspiciously. After all, Harry no longer frequented his room, at least not often as before the school term had started.

Harry had just felt like paying Snape a surprise visit out of the blue. Erm, actually, he had been feeling lonely, but he was not about to tell Snape that. Praying that Snape did not use Occulumency on him, he only informed Snape about his former thought, not the latter one. He'll be damned if he so much as_ hinted_ that he missed Snape. He could only imagine how much pleasure Snape would take in teasing him about being unable to resist his "charms".

"Get.Out.Now!", he heard Snape spit out maliciously. This made him remember none too fondly of the time that he had accidentally seen Snape's memory in the pensieve. Unless Harry's memory failed him, he had looked as angry as now.

Instinctively, Harry backed away as fast as he could, running all the way back to his dormitory.

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'This is just great, now he hates me', Harry thought a little sadly to himself once he had managed to catch his breath. Harry and Snape had formed the friendship that was so brittle…so fragile. And now it was broken because of his untimely arrival at Snape's room.

"Nice going, Harry!", he berated himself harshly. Now he was all alone, without even Snape as a friend. Maybe…Snape could forgive him, or they could both pretend that it did not happen?

"Hah, I doubt so", he told himself sardonically before falling asleep.

**-----Dream-----**

Harry was walking towards Snape's room. Suddenly, he was in Snape's arms.

Apparently, he was just slightly shorter than Snape instead of being nearly half a head shorter than him.

Snape was muttering something in his ear, but he could not really comprehend what Snape was saying for he was too distracted by the warm breath that was tickling his ear. He felt so contented to be in Snape's arms, not at all bothered by the close proximity in which they were in. Snape tilted Harry's chin up to look into those coal black eyes that were filled with lust and love, all for Harry.

Before Harry knew it, Snape's warm and soft lips descended upon his and Snape's tongue had slipped into his mouth. He closed his eyes in bliss and responded to his kiss…

**-----End of Dream-----**

Harry woke up with a start.

'What the hell? What was up with that? He did not just…dream of Snape doing that to him! He was certainly not gay! Was he?'

"Must have been something to do with what I saw earlier on", he grumbled.

_Great_, now he would not be able to get anymore sleep.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

"Harry, you look terrible!", Hermione told him worriedly

"Gee, thanks" was his reply, even though he silently agreed with her. After all, he did not get much sleep last night, not after awaking suddenly and remembering that…kiss. Even though he had spent a long time trying to decipher why he dreamt it in the first place (he hardly believed his own excuse of dreaming it because of his earlier occurrence), he still could not figure it out. Eventually, he just had to push it to the back of his mind.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

"Who can tell me what a nine-tailed fox is? 'Arry, why don't you give it a try!"

"What?" Harry was jolted unpleasantly from his thoughts. He looked up to find Hagrid looking expectantly at him.

"Er, it is a rare type of fox?", he guessed desperately.

"Not bad, it is actually a fox that can change its shape at will. That is why it is so rare to come across one, however if you do see one, you would recognize it by its white fur and of course, its nine tails", Hagrid informed the class

"Even a first year could have given a better answer. And how do we know that the nine-tailed fox really exist if nobody has really seen it?", Draco whispered loudly, obviously intending for Harry to hear.

Harry had a strong urge to pull Draco's hair out, but had to rely on every single ounce of self-constrain that he had in his body not to do so.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

"Hey Harry, are you all right? You seem distracted", Ron asked him, concern evident in his voice.

"Yeah", he told Ron absentmindedly. Ron did not look convinced, though he chose not to question Harry anymore about it.

He trudged along the corridors, tiredly heading towards his next lesson: Transfiguration.

"Harry, when are you going to-" He did not hear what else Hermione said, for at that moment, he glanced across and saw that the chandelier hanging from the ceiling had come loose. This, of course, could only be the works of Peeves the poltergeist. He watched with impeding horror, for Snape appeared not to have noticed the chandelier. Snape was walking right in the path of the chandelier.

His felt his whole body freeze and his blood run cold.

'Holy crap!', was his last thought before he dived to push Snape away, causing the chandelier to crash upon him. He vaguely felt pain all over his body before passing out.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

"The Savior of the day has decided to wake up, I see", was the first thing that Harry heard when he had regained consciousness.

Where was he? White ceiling, rose-scented beds…oh right. He was at the hospital wing. How_ smashing_.

"Did it ever occur to you that you could have used your _wand?_ Honestly, you're a Gryffindor through and through", Snape mocked him.

'Oh _right_…' he silently berated himself for his stupidity. When was he ever going to learn that he could use magic?

'Old habits die hard, I guess', he mused. After all, he had lived in the muggle world for 11 years, not using magic at all until he had arrived at Hogwarts. Apparently, Snape took his reply for silent agreement. They shared an awkward silence, unsure of what else to say. Thankfully, that awful silence was broken by Madam Pomfrey.

"Harry Potter! Can't live a few months without visiting the wards now, can you", she scolded him gently. He just gave her a guilty grin.

"I guess this means that you cannot take part in the upcoming Quidditch match…your teammates would not be pleased", she said crisply.

For the second time that day, he felt as if though his whole body went into shock.

"W-What! I have to play! It's my last game!", he stuttered despondently. Madam Pomfrey just gave him a slightly sympathetic look before going about her own business. Oh, how wonderful. He could almost imagine Ron coming after him with a broomstick for 'eliminating' himself from the Quidditch match. The match was in 2 days time! Maybe he could…

"Oh no you can't, Harry, Madam Pomfrey gave specific orders not to let you get out of bed until next week", Snape informed him, almost as if he had read his mind.

'O..K, maybe not'.

"You appear to be quite sane, so I shall take my leave now, lest one of your dear Gryffindors spot me", Snape said in a condescending tone before swooping out of the Hospital Wing.

True enough, they arrived within seconds of Snape's departure. Ron and Hermione immediately rushed over, with the rest of the Gryffindor Quidditch team not far behind.

"Harry! Oh gosh, you look like a mummy!"

"Harry! Do you feel better-"

"How are you going to play for the Quidditch match!"

Harry felt overwhelmed by all the people speaking at once. He looked at all the concerned faces and could not help but feel heartened. However, he was certainly not looking forward to telling them the bad news.

Hermione was just about to shush all of them when Madam Pomfrey arrived, no doubt attracted by all the commotion that they were causing.

"Out!Out! Only 6 people can visit him at one time. In case you haven't notice, he is in no condition to entertain all of you, let alone play for your silly Quidditch matches. Honestly, the matches cause more injuries than they are worth…Now quite badgering my patient!", she fussed. The entire Quidditch team cursed grudgingly before leaving.

When they were alone, Hermione immediately questioned Harry.

"What were you doing? You could have been killed!", Hermione told him in an accusing fault, as if though it was his fault that his own body had decided to act stupidly.

"Were you trying to save Snape? He's a git, for goodness sakes! Our number 2 enemy[A/N: Draco was their most hated enemy, of course. No, you couldn't have. There must be some other reason as to why you chose to squash yourself under the chandelier…"Ron muttered to himself, unaware that Harry could hear him.

Harry sighed irritably. Why couldn't they understand that he did not CHOOSE to do what he did, that he must have suffered from what Hermione fondly termed as "Hero's complex"? Honestly, he wanted to beat himself up for being so stupid. Now he had just lost his chance to play for his very last Quidditch cup.

"I…guess I did not think clearly", he answered, feeling confused himself. A moment later, Madam Pomfrey came to shoo Ron and Hermione away. They wished him a speedy recovery before leaving. Great, now he was stuck at this boring infirmary, all alone. Thank god for those Quidditch magazines that the Quidditch team had left for him.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

'Honestly, what was that boy thinking!'

He had been lost in his own thoughts, walking absentmindedly towards his next lesson when he was rudely pushed aside. He nearly tumbled to the floor, mind you. It was only thanks to the fact that it was simply not in his genes to stumble and fall that he did not fall flat on his arse. The next thing he knew, a chandelier had fallen on top of someone. It was only when Snape whipped out his wand to float the chandelier off the person that he got to see who it was.

Harry.

At the sight of Harry reduced to an unconscious pile on the floor, he panicked slightly, though it did not show on the outside. He quickly levitated Harry to the Hospital Wing, ignoring the odd looks that the other students were giving him.

"What happened to him?", Pomfrey demanded as soon as she caught sight of Harry's floating body.

He recounted the events in a monotonous voice, becoming more and more amused as Pomfrey became steadily redder in the face

"That boy would be the death of me! Getting pricked by all the broken glass from the chandelier is no joking matter! We should all thank the gods that the glass shards did not blind him or go in too deeply into his skin. I cannot imagine the consequences if one of those shards pierced him in the heart…", Pomfrey muttered ominously.

Snape agreed silently as well.

Not wanting to be seen by Harry's friends and risk ruining his 'evil' image, he made his exit swiftly, all the while worrying about Harry in his room. Snape hardly doubted that Harry would not wake up, but he was just worried that the shards might have caused some internal injuries, making his injuries much more serious.

As he was pacing around in his room, he had a flashback of what had happened. Suddenly, he realized what Harry had done.

Harry had 'saved' him.

Of course, he could not have gotten out of harm's way in time, but the fact was that Harry was injured all because of him. Snape felt slightly guilty for causing Harry's plight, before stamping out his feelings vehemently by reasoning that Harry could have been more intelligent while trying to 'save' him.

Nevertheless, he decided to wait until Harry's friends had gone before sneaking back into the ward to see how he was doing. Snape waited impatiently in the shadows until he saw all of them turn and leave before he strode in.

As soon as he sat at Harry's side, he could not help but notice that he was all wrapped up. It reminded him a little of those pictures of Egyptian mummies he had come across once or twice in some Dark Arts book. Only Harry's face was spared from the bandages. He seemed to have sported a light cut at his cheek as well and-

"Snape…", Harry murmured.

Snape's train of thought was broken by the soft but still distinguishable word that Harry was murmuring. Once again, he felt slightly accountable for the state Harry was in. Here he was, trying to deny that it was his fault, when Harry was still worrying about him even in his subconscious! That horrible thought certainly did not make him feel any better. (Yes, yes, contrary to popular belief, Snape did have a conscious)

Suddenly, he saw Harry's eyelids beginning to flicker, as if about to open. Snape hastily rearranged his expression to one of nonchalance, so that Harry would not be able to detect that he had actually been concerned about his well-being.

He adopted a monotonous tone to address Harry with and left as soon as he had the chance to. So now, here he was, feeling bad again that Harry could not play for the House Cup. He would not even be able to support his friends or watch the game as a spectator!

Just then, he had an inspiration. He could charm a mirror so that it would show what was going on during the Quidditch match! About time that nosy mirror was put to use [A/N: Yup, the same one that kept criticizing Harry and Snape's appearance, the one that was located in his room.

He went to the bathroom, pried out the mirror (ignoring the protests of the mirror) and then programmed the mirror to show the reflection of the Quidditch pitch by heading there himself. He did a complicated wave-like movement using his wand before muttering "_repercussus_". Now, all he had to do was to wait for the Quidditch match to take place.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Before Snape knew it, it was the day. He entered the ward after ensuring that his friends were not around. Immediately, he caught sight of a very depressed and bored Harry. Harry looked up at him in surprise before staring sadly at his bed again.

'Well I'm willing to bet that his mood would do a complete 180 degrees turn as soon as I tell him the good news', he mused. Snape whipped out the mirror and did the same charm again. This time, it showed the Quidditch pitch, complete with the sounds of screaming fans.

Predictably, Harry sported a grin on his face so fast that it seemed a little unhuman-like. Then again, Harry was always a little…weird.

"How did you do that? I_ have_ to learn that!", Harry beamed while asking him in a cheerful tone. Not wanting to risk people spying on him (mainly_ someone_ next to him), he refused to tell him.

Harry soon forgot about that, for he heard Lee Jordan announce the Gryffindor team's entry into the pitch. Ravenclaw's team also entered at the same time. Snape winced a little (inwardly of course) at the thundering racket that the crowd was making.

"Take your positions. On the count of three! One…Two…Three!", Snape heard Hooch yell out to the players.

The crowd went wild again when the game officially started. The only disadvantage was that they could not really see who the players were due to the size of the mirror, but other than that, they could still roughly make out whenever a team scored and who was leading. Currently, it was the Ravenclaws that were leading 30-10.

Snape's lips twitched a little when he recalled his own experience. His last Quidditch match as a Hogwarts student was the best one he had ever been in. The corners of his lips threatened to turn upwards as he vividly remembered swinging a Bludger during that match that it knocked Hufflepuff's seeker right off his broomstick.

"And they score! What a beautiful goal!" Snape was brought back to reality by Jordan's booming voice.

Sadly, he realized that he would not _ever _experience that wonderful sensation of being in the air again, nor would he want to. It simply brought too much painful memories.

He glanced at Harry, who seemed to be staring at the mirror with immense concentration. Whenever Gryffindor scored, his whole face would light up with happiness, however when Ravenclaw scored, he would look slightly stony. It was rather amusing, actually, to watch his expressions.

"Can you believe it? We are actually leading!" Harry said cheerfully. True enough, Gryffindor was leading 60-50.

"Well, that's not a lot" Snape drawled. Harry just shot him a look of disgust before turning his attention back to the game.

"Both seekers have seen it! They have found the snitch and they are speeding towards it! Who will catch it first? Will it be Ginny or Cho?" Jordan commented excitedly.

The crowd seemed to be holding their breath in anticipation as they watched them both race with all their might. And then…

"Madam Hooch says it's a tie! This means that both teams have to play overtime! We will go for an interlude of 10 minutes before both teams fight it out to be the winner. A lot is at stake here, so let's show them our support!", Jordan roared out to the crowd.

Once again, the cheers of hundreds boomed throughout the pitch.

It was fortunate that Dumbledore had the foresight to magically protect the pitch, if not the pitch would have collapsed due to the sheer force of the screams and cheers.

The crowd waited in apprehension, all the while chattering among themselves to ease the boredom. At long last, both teams returned to the pitch looking slightly refreshed and more determined than ever.

"And off they go!" Jordan announced to the crowd. This time, the seekers were not playing. It was all up to the rest of the team to score as many points as they could during those 10 minutes. The team that scored the most points would win.

All the players flew extremely well. Quaffles were being passed around at such a fast pace that it became a blur to the audience. Chasers were trying to score feverishly into the opposing team's hoops. All the players were executing fine displays of stunts just to avoid Bludgers that were flying at ferocious velocities towards them. This went on until…

"And we have a winner. It is…Gryffindor!" Jordan screamed out.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

At that moment, Harry was so elated over his team's success that he whooped for joy, nearly jumping out of bed while doing so. Unfortunately, this caused him to fall out of his bed, sending him on a one-way journey towards the floor.

What happened next was certainly not what he expected. Snape instinctively reached out to steady him and while doing so, both of their lips touched.

It was a brief moment, both lips ghosting across each others' lightly but the sensations caused were simply so intense that it felt as if electricity coursed through him. It was then that Harry realized what had just taken place.

"Holy crap", was his only thought before he saw Snape fleeing from the Hospital Wing with an absolute look of terror on his face.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

A/N: Well, my exams are still not yet over, but I couldn't resist typing out another chapter. I'll be done in about 2 weeks or so, so hang in there guys!


	9. A kiss to make it better, or worse

Why, you did not think that I abandoned this fic, did you? -raises an eyebrow and looks at you skeptically-

Anyway, thanks for waiting patiently for this chapter.

'Thoughts'

"Speech"

* * *

A kiss to make it better, or worse…

**---Snape's room---**

"Kill me now…I think I'll never be able to look at him without dying of embarrassment ever again", Snape thought frantically to himself.

And the worst thing was, he enjoyed it. He FUCKING enjoyed it.

He pinched the bridge of his nose in an attempt to ease the headache that was threatening to form. He was currently feeding Gaza absently and was trying to sort out the whirlwind of thoughts that were playing around in his head.

Why wasn't he disgusted or horrified by that incident?

His only explanation was that he was gay. Snape had always suspected, though he was not sure. Well, now he knew. One huge crush one James Potter (not that he would ever admit it to anyone even on his deathbed) did not condemn him to the world of gaydom, right? But this reaction towards that…accident was more than enough to confirm him a one way ticket to the world of gaydom. _Oh joy._

Yes…he knew that it was shocking, but it was true. He had a crush on James Potter.

Snape did not really know why he did, but it had been that way ever since he first laid eyes on that Potter. There was something about Potter's arrogant ways that irked him and yet caused Potter to earn his admiration. The way he would pull pranks effortlessly and the way that he was always the life of the party was also partly the reason why Snape liked him.

Snape knew that _he_ was way out of his league and so he was simply contented with watching James at a distance. However, those insufferable friends of his, Black and Lupin, had to always find fault with him. That Lupin was always too smart for his own good. Somehow, he had suspected that Snape _kind of_ had a crush on James and had always looked at Snape with a wary expression. As for that Black…It was mostly Black's fault that Snape was that miserable at Hogwarts. Black always seemed to enjoy picking on Snape. And of course, James supported everything that Black did and so joined him in tormenting Snape.

Now, Snape was by no means stupid. It was only due to his shrewdness and ability to escape stealthily that allowed him to survive to this day. However, on several occasions he was not so lucky…

Despite everything that James Potter did to him, he still could not hate him. However, he knew that it would be absolutely strange to the rest of the school population if he did not hate James despite all the pranks that they pulled on him, so naturally, he pretended to hate him. He pretended with every single ounce of acting ability that he had that he actually hated James, so as to lessen his "tormenting sessions", courtesy of Black, James and Lupin.

As for Wormtail…he had always been too afraid to do anything to him.

It had been a cruel twist of Fate on God's part for his best friend, Lily, to fall for his secret crush, James. He did not really hate her for it; for he did not even dare to hope for the possibility of him and James…It was just simply unfathomable. Therefore, he had to accept the fact with bitterness and with whatever generosity he had left in his heart.

The day when he first caught sight of Harry had been an emotional one for him. It was almost as if Harry symbolized everything that he could not have anymore---James, Lily's friendship, popularity…It had been quite simple for Snape to simply blame Harry for everything that he desired but was gone and thus his hatred for Harry formed.

But now, he was no longer able to do that anymore. Slowly but surely, the time that he had spent with Harry made him realize how Harry did not actually want the popularity that he had and how little control he had over his own life. Slowly, he began to see past his own blind hatred and started to see Harry for what he truly was, hence forming a reluctant friendship with him.

Well, one thing led to another and instead of a reluctant friendship, he had these…conflicting thoughts about Harry. Like now, how could he even have_ enjoyed_ it?!?

"I'm older than him by 20 years, for goodness sake!", he told Gaza exasperatedly as he fed her another dead rat. She eyed the plump rat with interest and promptly swallowed it whole.

'Wait, did he just think that? Did he just think that there was remote possibility of him being together with Harry? Did he just think that he wanted to be with him?'

'Shit, I'm in love with him', Snape realized, the truth finally sinking in.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

**---2 weeks later, in Harry's room---**

'That's it! I refuse to mope around wondering if I am…not straight', Harry concluded.

Harry had been haunted by the incident that happened two weeks ago. He hardly got a wink of sleep and it was really starting to show. Frankly, he had never looked or felt less sleep deprived.

------_Flashback_-----

"Oi Harry! Not sleeping well lately? Been having one of your 'late night adventures' again?", Fred asked him while wriggling his eyebrows suggestively.

"Wouldn't happen to be using our dear Marauders map to do some mischief?", George questioned, draping an arm over his shoulders.

"Nope, sorry to disappoint you guys, I just have… things that I'm confused about, that's all"

"Ah, it seems as if young Harry here is troubled. Do you have anything that you want to tell me?", Fred said, doing a fairly good imitation of Dumbledore.

"But honestly Harry, if we can help you in any way, just tell us. Let's not disturb our deep philosopher any more, shall we, George? Bye, Harry! We shall leave you to deal with your own thoughts" ,and with that, both of them left one still confused Harry to sort out his own thoughts all by himself.

-----_End Flashback_-----

If even Fred and George noticed his haggard looks, then he must truly look terrible.

Harry was sick and tired of evading Snape. It was certainly not easy at all to run around corners, speed out of Potions straight after his lesson had ended, rush out of the Hall immediately after he had finished eating to prevent Snape from getting a chance to talk to him…

"I'm going to do something about it. I'll…", Harry trailed off uncertainly. His brain worked furiously to think of what he could do.

Talk to the cantankerous guy? It was highly unlikely, as Harry seriously doubt that Snape would be of any help at all. On the contrary, Snape would just laugh in his face.

Ask other people if they thought he was gay?_ Right_, it was just another reason for people to look upon him as though he was an even bigger freak.

The idea that he was physically attracted to Snape was just preposterous, right? But yet, as Harry battled with his thoughts, he could not help but remember the jolt that passed through him when they erm, kind of brushed their lips together.

'Hah! I know! I'll just have to er, kiss Snape for a short while to prove to myself that it was the excitement over Gryffindor's victory that caused those strange feelings, not because…Ok. I'll just do it for a few seconds. Then if he is mad at me then I'll obliviate him. Yup.', he thought nervously.

Now all that was left was to find the perfect opportunity to put his plan into action.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

**----Dumbledore's Office-----**

Snape stood patiently outside Dumbledore's office, waiting for the idiotic Gargoyle to leap aside for him. He did not need the password, nor did he need to waste his time guessing the password like all the other idiots (namely students) because he knew that Dumbledore would be expecting him. Besides, Dumbledore always knew who it was standing outside his office. If the people who were waiting for him just stood outside for a while, instead of wasting their breath calling out the names of sweets, they would find out that Dumbledore would actually allow them to go in without passwords. Since Dumbledore always knew when a person was standing outside his office then naturally, he also knew who it was standing outside his office.

Sure enough, the gargoyle moved aside for him. Snape ignored the queasy feeling in his stomach and walked straight up the moving staircase.

"Ah, I believe that you are here to take the day off?", Dumbledore confirmed with a gentle tone in his voice.

Snape just looked at him with a blank look on his face and nodded.

"Professor Slughorn would be looking after your classes". Dumbledore paused for a while.

"Severus, if you need another day off…", he asked as usual, despite knowing what Snape would always tell him.

"One day is fine", he told Dumbledore curtly, clearly signaling that it was the end of their conversation.

"Very well. Of you go then, my boy"

'Boy?', Snape thought indignantly.

'Honestly, Dumbledore must be blind. Snape was 37 years old and he was definitely not a 'boy' by any standard!'

As he was heading towards his room, he wondered vaguely why Dumbledore always chose to look at people as if though they were young adolescents.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

"Snape Manor!", Snape called out before he stepped into the flames. The fire crackled invitingly before roaring to life and then sending Snape on his way to his former home.

When he reached his house, he paused for a moment to take a look at the dusty and less-than-grand looking house that was once his home, the place where his mother had once been beaten by his father in a fit of anger.

The house brought him nothing but bad memories, especially on this day, as Eileen Snape had died on this very date 26 years ago. Snape had merely been a child then.

His father had gotten back drunk and that was not good, for it only meant one thing---he was in a foul mood. On that fateful day, his father had been so enraged that he had used a lamp to hit his mother, much to Snape's horror. Usually his father only yelled at them when he was mad, but never before had he actually inflicted physical violence upon either one of them.

Snape had been too stunned to do anything. He could only watch from the sidelines with an impeding sense of horror, willing for it to stop. And finally, it did.

His father had stormed off to his bedroom, shutting the door with a resounding bang. Snape's mother was just sobbing quietly in the corner. Seeing his mother like that had torn him apart, but he did not know how to comfort his mother. He thought it was best if he gave her some privacy, for she looked as if she needed some.

What a mistake that had been.

The next day, when he woke up, he saw the newspaper article on the Daily Prophet that would change his life forever. His mother had flown on her broomstick the previous night despite of the storm and had gotten herself killed when the strong winds blew her straight into a tree.

At that moment, Snape was too ridden with guilt and sadness to have noticed anything else. All he knew was that it had been his fault. He knew that his mother flew on her broom sometimes when she was upset in order to clear her head and yet he had _given_ her the opportunity to do so.

Her death was entirely his fault.

And his failure to notice anything order than his grief and guilt caused him to make another mistake.

The next day, he woke up to find that his father had killed himself by stabbing himself fatally in the chest with a knife.

It was long before he could get over his grief and accept the loss of both of his parents. It had taken him an awfully long time to gather up the courage to sit on a broomstick and fly on it, because it had been the way his mother had died.

But finally, he had managed to do so. In fact, he even became the beater for the Slytherin Quidditch team! It was only on occasional moments that his heart clenched painfully when he remembered.

Snape shook himself mentally to get rid of his thoughts and cleared his mind before apparating to the location of his mother's and father's graves.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

He took in the ever familiar sight of the abandoned patch of grassland. The wild grass thrived and their long blades swayed gently in the wind as if they were alive, in ironic contrast to the lifeless bodies that resided deep in the soil of the very same patch of grassland.

He plucked a couple of blades of wild grasses and transfigured them into bouquets of tulips, as tulips had been his mother's favourite kind of flower.

He knelt in front of her grave for a long time, telling his mother how he had experienced strange occurrences, like his body swap with Harry and how it had unexpectedly caused him to see Harry in a new light. He also whispered words of well wishes before he knelt in front of his father, Tobias Snape's grave.

Although his father had indirectly caused his mother's death, he knew that it had not been intentional. He also knew that his father had loved his mother dearly. Therefore, he had not hated him. On the contrary, he just wished that his father had not been such a coward as to take his own life, leaving Snape behind to deal with his own grief.

Likewise, he whispered well wishes for his father and hoped that both of them could be happy together in whatever place that dead people went to.

After what seemed like a long time, Snape finally stood up. He grimaced slightly as he waited for the numb feeling in his legs to go away and then he finally apparated back to Snape manor.

This time though, he could look around and not feel pain, for he had visited their graves.

He was fine now.

He even managed to smile a little when he stepped into the fireplace of the manor to floo himself back to his room.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

'Where is he?', Harry thought impatiently. He had been waiting for Snape for nearly a whole afternoon as he had wanted to put his plan into action straight after all his lessons had ended.

However, as luck would have it, the one day that he decided that he wanted to see Snape, Snape had simply disappeared for the day.

While sitting on the comfortable armchair in Snape's room, Harry became so bored that he had accidentally fallen asleep.

Therefore, he felt rather disorientated when he had awoken. He rubbed his eyes blearily and picked his glasses up from the floor, wiping them clean before placing them on the bridge of his nose.

Then, there was a loud roar that came from the fireplace that caused Harry to jump up in shock. He looked nervously at the fireplace to see none other than Snape's form stepping gracefully from it.

'Oh man, here goes nothing', he thought nervously to himself while fighting to get the squirmy feeling that his stomach had suddenly acquired under control.

He took a deep breath and rushed over to Snape's side before he could change his mind. And then, he stood on the tip of his toes and tilted his face slightly upwards to give the older man a rather firm kiss on his mouth.

His legs nearly gave way from all the intense emotions that he felt.

To put it simply, it was…overwhelming.

'Ok. That was definitely not normal.'

He broke the kiss in alarm, feeling utterly confused. However, he was rudely shocked out of his own confusion when he saw the slightly dazed and puzzled look on Snape's face.

'Oh shit, oh shit. Now what? Oh yeah, obliviate Snape!'

His right hand swiftly delved into his robes to pull out his wand.

'I'm sorry, Snape', he thought regretfully to himself before he attempted to rid the Potions Master of his memories about this whole incident.

"_Obli_-"

"_Expelliarmus_!", Snape barked out before Harry could obliviate him.

"What on earth do you think you are doing? Are you _attempting_ to obliviate me?", Snape hissed out dangerously before accioing his wand away.

Uh oh. Silly as it sounded, Harry did not think of the possibility of Snape taking his wand away.

'Great. Now he could not even obliviate himself to spare himself the humiliation and horror of facing HIM.'

It was official. He was in deep shit.

"Erm, I…I-I…", Harry stuttered while backing away from the menacing Potions master skittishly He felt his back press against something cold.

Oh crap. A wall. He was, most unluckily, trapped.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

'Who the hell did that blasted boy think he was anyway, thinking that he could just come and… kiss people at random and then obliviate them and get away with it?' This Potter was getting weirder and weirder everyday.

Unbeknownst to Snape, he was scaring the wits out of Harry. All Snape knew was that he had to find out what was truly Harry's reason for doing what he did. It was strange though, that despite his annoyance at Harry, he still felt slightly breathless by that sorry-excuse-for-a-kiss.

And before Snape knew what he was doing, he had leaned towards Harry and had kissed him.

He claimed Harry's lips hungrily, nearly moaning aloud at the wonderful soft feeling of Harry's lips. His tongue darted out, trying to gain access to the boy's mouth. Harry hesitated for a short moment before responding. Snape quickly seized the opportunity to snake his tongue in. His tongue caressed Harry's one gently, causing Harry to shiver slightly.

Snape felt a rush of heat that he had not felt in years coursing through his veins, making him feel warm yet cold all over.

And suddenly, he realized what he was doing. _He was kissing Harry_, Harry James Potter, whom was younger than him by 20 years for god's sake!

He hastily broke the kiss and felt as if though he was going to die of self-disgust and embarrassment. Honestly, only that boy could cause him to be so utterly embarrassed. He had no idea why he always felt so embarrassed and why Harry always caught him in less than flattering situations.

"S-Snape?", he heard Harry ask him. For the first time since he was a teenager, he was at a loss of words.

"Snape, I am very sorry. I dunno what came over me; I swear I must be crazy to even think of kissing you, of liking you and even thinking that you would like me. I promise that I forgot that it ever happened, or did happen or accidentally happened or happened accidentally-on-purpose… I promise I would not tell anyone, I'll swear that I would not tell a soul-" Harry babbled before Snape finally cut him off.

"Stop your inane gibbering at once!", he could not help but snap out harshly, but after seeing Harry's hurt look, he softened the tone of his voice before continuing.

"You…like me?", he asked Harry a little suspiciously before mentally slapping himself for sounding so stupid.

"Erm, yes?"

Snape felt a tiny prick of anger and irritation at that uncertain reply.

"For goodness sakes you either like me or you don't. What is there to be so confused about?". His tone came out a little harsher than he had intended it to be, for he was feeling more than a little vulnerable at that point in time.

"Ok fine I_ looooveee_e you, happy now?"

Snape looked up just in time to see Harry showing an expression of utmost determination, then one of utmost horror. If the situation had not been so serious, the sudden change of expressions on Harry's face might actually have been rather comical.

Despite Harry's "declaration", he could hear his own doubts screaming in his head

"Harry, in case you haven't notice, I am almost old enough to be your father, ok scratch that, I_ am_ old enough to be your father, so how can it be possible?", he questioned exasperatedly. This whole…thing was way too weird.

"I dunno", was Harry's less-than-enlightening reply. Clearly, Harry was as confused about his emotion as he was.

_'Oh great_, what on earth had he gotten into? Even though relationships between teachers and students were not forbidden, but Harry was no ordinary student. Harry was the boy-who-lived, for god's sake! He was the dark lord's most hated enemy, while he, Severus Snape, was his supposedly faithful death eater! How on earth was he going to hide the fact that he was actually faithful to the Order if word spread around that he was even friends, let alone_ together _with Harry?'

"Uh Snape? Can I stay here tonight?", Harry asked him, jerking him out of his thoughts.

Feeling as though he had no more energy left to go into another argument with Harry, he just agreed before stalking of towards his bathroom.

By the time he had returned, Harry had fallen asleep on the couch.

'I shouldn't have gotten rid of that transfigured bed', he mused before heading towards his own bed.

He was utterly exhausted, for today had been one helluva emotional roller coaster ride.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

What do you think of this chapter? Oh yeah and by the way, if you,( Yes you, my dear reader) happen to spot any…odd loopholes in the story, could you please tell me? It would certainly help to improve the story:)


	10. The solution to get rid of Ultragitness

**Warning: Long awaited slash is here!**

'Thoughts'

"Speech"

_Spells, emphasis_

//Parseltongue//

* * *

The solution to get rid of "Ultra-gitness"

In Snape's room while Harry was asleep…

**-----Dream-----**

Harry stood before his five wretched Death eaters in an unplottable hut in Little Hangleton.

"Fools! How many times must I tell you not to leave.any.evidence.behind?", he emphasized the last four words by casting crucio at Malfoy, Black, Crabbe and Goyle. He could not help but enjoy the power that their pain made him feel. However, he wanted more. A cruel smirk spread across his face as he upped the power that he poured into the spell, causing them to scream even louder than ever.

Ah, what bliss. Their pain was his source of power. For every ounce of pain that they felt, he experienced his powers growing greater steadily; it was as if he could seep in their pain and convert it to pure raw power.

"Tell me, how many times must I tell you that at no expense must you be seen?", he taunted, not really expecting any one of those pathetic morons to answer him.

"_Avada Kedavra_", Harry whispered without warning and almost lovingly while pointing his wand towards Avery.

He just loved the way Avery screamed in sheer agony, as all his victims did when they felt their heart bursting most horribly before they died. The way their eyes just dimmed when they drew their last breath was simply fascinating, don't you think?

"What's done is done. Never mind, let Dumebledork and the rest of his precious wizarding world panic when they see their _dear_ wand maker dead. It would not do to let them think that we are hiding, right my Death eaters?"

The remaining death eaters knew better than to disagree with their Dark lord when he was in a temper, not that they actually dared to disagree with him in the first place.

He laughed a cold, humourless laugh, one that he knew that would intimidate them more than anything before waving a hand to dismiss them.

"Stupid minions, when I am invincible I would finally be able to kill them, kill every single one of them…", Harry thought with malicious glee to himself.

Just then, the scene changed.

Instead of being in a house, he was now in the Potions dungeon. With Snape.

He was pressed up close against Snape, so close that he could feel the heat radiating right of him. Harry raked his hands through Snape's soft hair, the very hair that was no longer greasy (because Harry had influenced Snape to wash it every day). His hands traveled down Snape's neck, sliding across Snape's back until it reached his bottom.

Harry gently ran his hands across each butt cheek, pinching it lightly and enjoying the way it made Snape's breath hitch. But finally, his hands came to rest on their destination. Harry could barely stop his hands from shaking as he pulled down the zipper, revealing Snape in all of his glory.

He rubbed his hands over the clothed erection, loving the way it hardened just for him. However, he was momentarily distracted when Snape tilted his chin upwards and kissed him.

Harry eagerly responded to the kiss, his tongue entering Snape's mouth and exploring it…

**-----End of Dream-----**

Harry jerked awake all of a sudden, panting slightly and feeling as if though he had just run a marathon.

'What the hell was that about? One moment he was Voldemort and the next he was having foreplay with Snape?!?'

Harry sighed as he knew that he would not be getting anymore sleep that night.

He slid off the couch, stepped on the warm carpet on the floor and headed towards Gaza, praying that she was awake. Thankfully, she stared at him with her huge pinkish eyes when he opened the lid of the box; a clear indication that she was wide awake.

//Feeling troubled, Harry?//

He swallowed nervously. Suddenly, telling her what he had dreamt about didn't seem like such a good idea anymore.

//I'm just confused about my feelings for…someone. I'm not sure if I love hi-her//, he corrected himself hastily.

//Well, itssss rather ssssimple actually. How do you feel when you are around her?//

//I, er, like her but at the same time, it is wrong for us to be together. H-She…I…think I love her, but how do you know if you love someone?//, he questioned her uncertainly.

//You're asking me, a supposedly cold-blooded snake?//, she hissed in amusement before continuing//Well, snakesss do not show assss much emotionssss as humans, but I do understand what love issss. I know that humanssss like you tend to think about your loved oness and look dazed almost all the time. You sssilly humansss would alsssso do anything to make sure that the one you love isss safe and happy. Take Severusss for example. He once loved a boy, even though that boy alwaysss bullied him. I alwayssss thought that he wasssss being foolish.//

Harry was mildly surprised that Snape loved someone during his school years and subconsciously filed the information away for future references.

//But I…//, he trailed off, swamped by all his conflicting feelings. How could he tell her that her that he did not want to be a murderer and cause Snape's death? And also, he did not think that he would be able to survive the guilt of knowing that Snape died because of his own selfish wants.

The dreams, or rather, nightmares that he had before the one that he had with Snape in it only elevated his doubts.

//But young Harry, why would you call yourself a murder?//, he heard Gaza hiss in curiosity.

'Oops. Guess he said his previous thoughts out loud.'

He sighed. Since she knew the truth, he might as well tell her everything.

Therefore, he told her everything; from all the neglect that he received from the Dursleys, the way they bullied him into doing their chores, the way they starved him sometimes. He sat in front of the fire, with Gaza curled round his hand as he told her of the happy moments that he had after arriving at Hogwarts. He did not know how long he sat there for, recounting his 'adventures' that he had with Voldemort, explaining to her why exactly was he a murderer.

When he was finally done, he noticed that she was looking at him with a slightly pitying gaze.

//Now don't look at me like that, this is why I hate confiding in people. Please, Gaza…//

//Sorry, I didn't realize that I wasss doing that. You are more than deserving to be with Severusssss. That poor boy just needssss to be loved sometimessss. You know, Harry, it is no good to try and stop yourself from loving him, for you would only regret it later on. Trust me.//

When Harry did not appear to be convinced, she persuaded him further

//Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn't. So all you have to do is listen to yourself//, she told him somewhat sleepily.

_'Great, she just had to add on to the confusion'_

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

After putting Gaza back into her box so she could get some well-needed sleep, Harry walked over to where Snape was sleeping and looked at him. '_Did he really love him?'_

It was strange really, how vulnerable Se-Snape looked when he was asleep. He even looked…at peace with himself. Harry wondered why Snape chose to appear as such a bitter and cruel person when he was not. He knew of this fact for sure, as all the time that he had spent with Snape showed him that Snape could be witty, funny and on several occasions even nice when he wanted to.

Without realizing what he was doing, Harry tucked a stray lock behind Sev's ear.

'Much better', he thought to himself with satisfaction.

He then traced the side of Sev's cheek with a finger.

'_Could I bear to see him get tortured by Voldemort if Voldemort found out about us?'_

Harry leaned over and placed a soft kiss on his forehead and then his hands touched Snape's arm lightly…

Snape's eyes immediately shot open and he grabbed Harry's hand. If Harry's hand had not been caught in that vice-like grip, he would have stumbled to the ground from the sheer shock of that sudden movement.

"What the hell are you doing", Snape snarled as he glared at Harry with the coldest glare Harry had ever seen.

He gulped. Crap, this would need a lot of explaining.

"I-I", he started before he realized that he was unable to explain the situation. He tried in vain to hide the blush that was rising steadily up his cheeks.

"I'm asking you for the last time. What. The. Hell. Do. You. Think. You. Are. Doing?", Snape spat out.

Harry could not help but squirm under his gaze. He fell silent for a while, trying to think of a suitable explanation.

"I-I saw that your blanket had fallen, so I wanted to put it back in place", he lied somewhat lamely.

Snape narrowed his eyes in suspicion.

"Next time, just leave my blanket alone. Forget it, it's almost time for me to be up anyway", he grumbled before he went to brush his teeth.

'Oh great, he's back to being a grumpy git', Harry thought and he could not help but feel a little dejected

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

For the rest of the day, Snape was an "ultra git", as Ron would say. Snape would just dock points from the other houses for the slightest reasons, examples of which were: breathing, sneezing, talking, asking questions…

At the end of the day, most of the students who attended his lessons were either crying or cursing him through seven hells and back.

Harry could not take it any longer. He decided to confront him.

That evening, Harry told a confused Ron and Hermione to wish him good luck before he headed to his "doom". If the situation was not so nerve-wracking, Harry might even have found the sight of Hermione looking confused odd and maybe a little amusing.

When he entered Snape's room, he saw that Snape was marking his students' essays as usual, no doubt writing scathing remarks that would make some First-Year burst into tears or something.

How should he go about it? He should probably be blunt and straight to the point.

"Snape, why were you acting so moody today?"

Oops, judging from the enraged look on Snape's face, that was the wrong thing to say.

"15 points from Gryffindor for being so rude to a teacher, Potter", Snape spat.

Potter? Harry could not help but raise his eyebrows at that. Snape had not called him that when they were alone for months!

"Ok fine I rephrase that. Why were you so grumpy today? You were more grumpy than usual-"

Harry was about to continue when Snape cut him off.

"Another 10 points from Gryffindor. I do not find the need to explain myself to you, Mister Potter. I can choose to be grumpy anytime I want. Now quit being a nosy parker and get out of my sight.", Snape told him evilly.

Why was he acting like this? Harry was torn between throttling Snape and kicking him in the shins. He blinked back angry tears. It must have been something to do with that kiss.

It was true that he kissed Snape first, but nobody asked Snape to kiss him back right? It was not as if he forced Snape to kiss him back. Snape did it himself and now he was acting like a total asshole about it.

Harry wanted to storm out of the room, but it was as if his feet were rooted on the spot. He could only stand there with a shocked and hurt expression. Of course, he tried to wipe away that expression away quickly. Harry would not allow Snape the satisfaction of seeing how upset his words made him.

Harry tried to come up with an equally hurting remark, but found that he was simply unable to do so. It was then that he realized that he was _really, truly_ in love with Snape.

No! He'll be damned if he showed any form of weakness in front of Snape. He would not cry even if it killed him. Miraculously, Harry found some strength left in him to rush to Gaza's box, wrap her around his neck and then rush out of Snape's room before he could stop him

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

//Harry, what'ssss wrong?//, Gaza asked him, concern evident in her voice. Harry just ignored her until he was inside the Room of Requirement. He paused for a while to regain his breath (she sure was heavy) before he answered her.

//Snape…he was so annoying and stupid and idiotic and it was almost as if he hated me, just like before. But I'm fine now. I'm sorry that I'm acting so silly and all…// he trailed off before his throat closed up and he could not say anything else.

//No Harry, itsss ok. I told you that Severusss alwaysss acted silly when he wasss in love-//

//No, Gaza that was not merely acting silly. You should have seen the hatred in his eyes. I don't know why I'm so affected by it actually. I mean, it's not as if he had never insulted me before. I-It just feels different this time…//, Harry said as he let out a bitter chuckle.

//Harry, listen to me//. When Harry did not look at her, she tried again.

//Harry! You have got to pull yourssself together. You're overreacting. I know thissss boy and I promise you that he does not hate you. He's just confused and he isss trying to push you away. You love him, don't you?//

When Harry nodded, she continued.

//You just have to wait for him to admit that he lovessss you. Of course, you can help matters along…//,she told him with a mischievous glint in her eyes.

//Erm, what do you mean by that?//

//Why, you can sssseduce him!//, she said as she winked at him.

Harry choked. He certainly did not expect Gaza to say that. But he supposed that she was right. He would not be like a sitting duck and watch Snape retreat back to being a nasty git, not when he knew how much of a good person he could actually be.

'Snape, prepare to die', Harry thought with an impish smirk on his face before he laid down on the humongous bed before him.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Snape sank back into his armchair, feeling mentally and physically drained. He had used almost every ounce of self-restrain that he had not to go forward and comfort Harry when he saw the hurt look that Harry had. He had almost apologized to him, goddamnit!

It was so hard to pretend that he hated the guy, especially so when he had known that Harry would hate him after that. Fortunately, he had years of acting experience to rely on.

However, he did not expect Harry to react as he had. Snape had merely expected Harry to fling some insult and storm off. But instead, Harry had to act like some melodramatic fool and grab Gaza along with him as well. Who knew what he was telling Gaza? Maybe Gaza might even bite him next time.

"Stupid fool sure knows how to make a person feel guilty", he muttered irritably under his breath before swiping the scrolls he had been marking clean off the table.

'What's done is done. And I'm not going to regret it. It's better for all of us'. That was the last thought Snape had before he fell asleep that night.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Harry woke up, feeling better than he had ever done in ages, as he had **A Plan**. The corners of his lips turned up into a mischievous grin. He scooped Gaza up gently, wound her round his neck carefully so that he did not disrupt her sleep and tiptoed quietly towards the dungeons.

Upon reaching Snape's room, he lowered Gaza gently back into her box. Gaza merely let out a soft hiss.

Then, he picked up a quill and a piece of parchment on Snape's table and started writing. When he was done, he silently left the room with laughter bubbling inside of him.

_'Oh, the look on Snape's face would be priceless.'_

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

When Snape opened his eyes, he immediately sensed that something was wrong. He glanced over and saw that Gaza was back in her box. But that meant…

He looked around to see if any of his items had been touched. From the looks of it, nothing except that piece of parchment had been tampered with He could have sworn that it was on the right corner of his desk, not right smack in the middle of it.

Harry must have left a message.

Snape walked over slowly, secretly hoping that Harry did not curse him through a thousand hells and back and picked up the parchment.

* * *

**Dearest Sev**

**I long to be the one to kiss you awake every morning, to run my hands through your soft hair.**

**I long to touch your body in a soft caress; to make you more aware**

**I long to taste every inch of you, to make you mine**

**To lick and kiss till you whine and pine**

**I long to take you in me, to suck you till you scream**

**To make you beg and act horny just for me**

**--------------------------------------------------**

**I love you so much, can't you see**

**How much you mean to me**

**If you can't**

**Then I guess you're as dumb as a flea**

**Love,**

**Harry Potter**

**Golden Boy, Boy-who-lived, whatever.**

* * *

Snape dropped the parchment as abruptly as if he had been burned. His face had turned the most horrible shade of red. 

'Oh great, he just had to plant those mental images in my head! How am I going to look at him and prevent myself from getting aroused? Things are never normal with Harry isn't it? He just has to be so damn thick-skinned and make my life so miserable', he thought in despair.

Ok, he was_ sooo_ not looking forward to going to the Hall for breakfast today.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

When Snape finally managed to control his blush, he made his way to the Hall and purposely avoided looking at the Gryffindor Table. He settled down and started to eat his breakfast. After a few moments, he realized that someone was staring at him. He did his best to ignore that person –he highly suspected it to be Harry-. But that person was seriously starting to irritate him.

'If it's Harry then so be it; I'm not going to be afraid of him, for god's sake', he thought furiously to himself.

And with that, he wrenched his gaze from his scrambled eggs and mustered the best glare that he could.

_Oh crap_. Harry was grinning at him and he winked. Just when Snape thought that it could not get any more embarrassing, Harry decided to stick out his pink tongue and lick his lips.

He seriously felt like he was on fire. Snape knew that he would only turn redder by the minute; therefore not wanting to look like a long-lost cousin of the Weasleys, he stood up swiftly and left the Great Hall with as much dignity as he could pretend to have.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

**I decided to alter the last part a little to make it more...plausible. Thanks _3cheers4Snape_!**


	11. And they finally get together

'Thoughts'

"Speech"

_Spells, emphasis_

//Parseltongue//

* * *

And finally, they get together

As soon as he was sure that the last of Snape's billowing cloaks were out of the Great Hall, Harry let out the nervous breath he had unconsciously been holding.

'I hope he does not see through my acting', he thought ominously, though he could not help but feel proud of his own acting skills.

God, that was embarrassing! Thinking about it was one thing, but actually doing it…

If Harry had not been so determined not to let Snape think that he was nervous, he would have fled from the Hall just like Snape himself

"Geez, where's the fire?", Seamus commented, referring to Snape's hasty exit from the Hall.

Others all around the Gryffindor table were all similarly trying to guess what could have happened.

"He must have thought of a new hare-brained scheme to torture students with…"

"Maybe he left his cauldron boiling? Hopefully the dungeons would be destroyed", Ron quipped optimistically.

Hermione just looked at him as if though he was the greatest idiot on earth.

"You actually _think_ that Professor Snape would do something as important as that? Honestly Ron…"

Harry did not hear the rest of Hermione's ranting as he became preoccupied with his own thoughts. Thoughts of whether he had actually done the right thing to erm, flirt with Se-Snape. He could easily be forcing Snape to make an enemy out of him.

"Hey, are you going to eat that?", Ron asked him, pointing towards Harry's mutilated croissant. Harry worked hard to keep the look of pure astonishment (Ron was actually still hungry after eating his fourth croissant!) off his face and willingly gave his croissant away.

He had lost his appetite anyway.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

"For goodness' sakes, Harry, concentrate!", Hermione hissed to him for the third time.

Well, it was not his fault that his mind was preoccupied with Snape right? It was almost impossible to stop thoughts of Snape from popping into his head. Or rather, images actually. Images of Sev smirking but without malice, eyes glittering with humour. Sev rolling his eyes good naturedly at another one of Harry's 'weird' actions, as Severus liked to call it.

Sev with the look of pure lust in his eyes as he moved towards Harry to kiss him…

"Harry, I'm warning you for the last time, if you're not going to make any effort to concentrate…Ugh, I wash my hands off you!", Hermione proclaimed irritably.

"Ok fine, be that way…", he muttered darkly.

Apparently Ron and Hermione were over their sweet lovey-dovey stage and were both back to normal. Harry stifled a sigh. It would be harder to find opportunities to meet Sev with Hermione watching his actions like a hawk.

The bell rang, signaling the end of their torturous potions lesson. Everyone packed their stuff at super speed and evacuated the cold and unpleasant dungeons within minutes.

Harry knew that this had to be done. It was inevitable. He gathered what courage he had within him before telling Ron and Hermione that he had left his quill behind in the dungeons and then doubling back. He failed to notice a pair of brown eyes looking back at his retreating form with something akin to suspicion.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

"Se-Snape,I-" Harry never got to finish his sentence, for Snape rudely interrupted

"Potter! Were you the one who wrote that letter?"

"What letter?".

Oh, feigning ignorance was so fun and the sight of Snape's enraged face made it even more amusing.

"Fine, if you want to be that way. Two can play at that game", he heard Snape mutter in an undertone before he continued, "If you have nothing else to say, then you should leave. I am rather busy, unlike someone who obviously lacks the intellect to actually find something better to do. Out of my way you dunderhead before I start dishing out detention", he threatened maliciously.

"You-"

"Will you get out of my classroom now or do you have to wait for me to give you an invitation card?"

Harry thought he would burst with irritation and rage at Snape's less-than-mature behaviour and pretty much told him so.

"That's it! I've had enough of your silly actions! We're obviously friends and you can choose to act otherwise, but I refuse to do so. So you can stop your sad attempts at driving me away because I will not fall for it!", Harry told him adamantly.

Snape looked flabbergasted for a long moment, all the while staring intently at Harry as if though expecting him to shout out 'April Fools Day'. He even opened and closed his mouth a few time as if wanting to tell Harry exactly what he thought about Harry's declaration before finally looking defeated.

"Fine whatever, just stop sending me those kind of messages", Snape told him warningly.

"What kind of messages?"

"Don't feign innocence, it's definitely not becoming of you. You know very well what I'm talking about. Honestly I still get _Goosebumps_ just from the thought of it",

Harry grinned. At least they had some sort of truce now.

"Deal"

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

And so they remained friends (at least that was what Sev thought). If people looked hard enough, they would actually see the subtle signs. Signs such as the gazes shared between them. They were no longer filled with hate or distaste (both of them had unknowingly stopped acting like they hated each other).

There were also signs, such as Snape no longer breathing down Harry's neck during Potions lessons. As a matter of fact, Snape no longer picked on Gryffindors for the most mundane things and he no longer deducted points from Gryffindors for the most absurd reasons.

Of course, people were speculating and gossiping about what could have caused such a change in Snape (had he taken a 'anti-git' potion by accident?) but nobody really came close to the truth. Well, everyone except a certain bushy haired Gryffindor, but even she did not guess the complete truth.

After a while, people stopped getting suspicious and they just accepted things as they were. After all, there was always new gossip within Hogwarts that were more interesting then some silly notations about an overgrown bat.

Harry had been getting more and more worried as the summer holidays approached that Dumbledore would 'conveniently' forget that Harry would turn 17 over the summer and that he no longer needed to go back to the Dursleys. He did not think that he would have been able to survive another summer at the Dursleys, knowing fully well that there had not been such a need.

Thankfully, Dumbledore cheerfully reminded him on the last day of the school term (as if _he_ needed reminding) of that fact. Harry had kept a cool façade until he left Dumbledore's office. After that, he had let out an undignified whoop for joy and skipped all the way back to his dormitory, doing a pretty good imitation of Dobby when he was excited.

He knew that he would be staying at Hogwarts again, as he wanted to enjoy living in Hogwarts for the first time during the summer holidays. As almost half the year had gone by, he wanted to spend as much of his time just simply going round to remember the castle.

The thought that he would have to graduate at the end of next year made him rather sad sometimes, so he was determined to remember as much of the castle as possible. Besides, how often could he have the Quidditch Pitch all to himself on any afternoon that he chose?

Thus, he made up his mind to stay in Hogwarts. Ron was a little reluctant and disappointed that he did not want to stay with the Weasleys for the summer, but when Harry assured him that he would definitely stay with the Weasleys for the next summer, he brightened up considerably.

He smiled as he watched Ron and Hermione board the train and he waved back at them happily.

"Those two could definitely use some more 'couple time' anyway", he smirked slightly as that thought occurred to him.

'And now, let the fun begin', he mused.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Harry was slightly breathless due to the fact that he had run all the way to the Quidditch Pitch in his haste to fly. He smiled mischievously as he administrated an "_Alohomora_" to open the broom cupboard and retrieve his Firebolt.

He mounted it swiftly and kicked off the ground, feeling the familiar rush of joy flood him as he rose higher and higher above the grounds. All his doubts and problems ceased at that moment. For now, it was all about feeling the wind in his hair and whipping at his face. Everything in the magical world could change, but this peaceful feeling would never, ever be different for him.

No more Sev. No more trying to win him over. No more Voldemort to worry about.

He was flying so high that he could feel his hands freezing to the handle of his broom, the icicles forming in his hair. When he decided that he had gained enough altitude, he started plunging vertically downwards, flattening himself against his Firebolt so as to increase the speed of his descent.

Harry felt his stomach churn around slightly, but not in an unpleasant way. However, he was not affected by this feeling, for he was used to it.

All he focused on was the circle that marked the center of the pitch, relishing how it seemed to grow bigger and bigger before his eyes at breakneck speed. His eyes watered slightly, but he pushed that slight discomfort away easily due to the sheer amount of adrenaline that was pumping through him.

He was descending, descending all the way…and then suddenly, he Stopped. He Stopped as abruptly as if someone had yelled out the word in his head. It was weird really, how he always knew when to brake, when to stop in time to prevent himself from crashing to the ground.

Harry did a couple of barrel rolls simultaneously, taking pleasure in the way it made him feel slightly dizzy, queasy and yet energized all at the same time.

He circled the pitch as if in search of a snitch, smiling as memories of all his Quidditch matches and practices flooded him. He also recalled fondly the time when he had his race with Snape.

Finally, upon catching sight of the setting sun, he decided that it was time to stop flying. He descended gradually, after which he placed his Firebolt back in the broom cupboard. He then cast back the locking charm on the broom cupboard before walking back to the common room.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

//Phew, it sure has been a busy day, what with helping Ron with his last minute packing and then sending both of them off in the afternoon//, he informed Gaza, 'both of them' referring to Ron and Hermione, of course.

It was a good thing that he managed to persuade Sev to let him look after Gaza during the holidays, as he was nearly all alone in the castle, save for Dumbledore, Professor Flitwick and some third year Ravenclaw. He imagined that he would have been rather lonely without her.

//Oh good for you, now if you don't mind, I would like to get some ssssleep//, Gaza replied him sleepily.

Harry just shook his head in exasperation. Honestly, Gaza was ALWAYS sleeping. It seemed as if though she slept for more hours than she was awake.

Now that she was asleep and Harry no longer had anything else that he wanted to do, he whipped out his alarming pile of homework and started to work on his four foot essay for Professor Sprout, describing what an Ergypot was, precautions to be taken when looking after it and where it was usually found.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Harry woke up to the sensation of being squeezed. It felt as if his chest was tightening or something. Oddly, it kind of resembled the sensation that one would associate to apparating.

//Gaza!//, he hissed while glaring at said snake.

She merely laughed at him.

//That is not my favourite way of waking up, you know. You could at least shout at me if you wanted me to wake up//, he chided her in a mock serious tone.

//Oh, but why bother? Squeezing you awake issss so much more fun//, she said mischievously.

_'Ok, that was seriously disturbing.'_

//Er, I'll prefer if you kept your squeezing tendencies to yourself, thanks. I don't really enjoy feeling like some suffocating field mouse//, he teased gently.

She just pretended to look offended.

There was a long silence, during which Harry was trying to figure out what he wanted to do for the day. Eventually, he let out a frustrated sigh.

//Gaza?//

//Hmm?//

//I'm bored//, he complained.

//Oh and what am I ssssupposed to do about it?//, she asked coolly. Harry was sure that if she had eyebrows, they would have been raised.

//Er, do you have any suggestions?//

//Well, we can always pay a visit to Severussss…//

//Yeah but I can't floo or apparate there//, Harry sighed.

//Oh that's not a problem for me-// she began but was cut off by Harry's surprised squawk.

//What! You can actually visit him if you wanted?//

//Why of course! After living so many yearssssss as his faithful pet, you don't expect me not to know his addresssssss, do you?//

//No, no, what I meant was that how do you actually leave to see him? Isn't his house very far away?//

//Well, I apparate just like any other wizard doesssss//

Harry felt his jaw drop.

//You…can apparate?//, he asked, feeling absolutely gobsmacked.

//Of course I can! Why can't I?//, she asked, looking at him quizzically. Harry shook his head.

//Never mind, that's not important. But how do you do it in Hogwarts? Nobody can apparate in or out of Hogwarts//

//I'm not sure, but I just can. Maybe it's something to do with the fact that I'm a ssssnake. Who cares? Anyway, how else do you think I manage to get food when Severussss is too busy to feed me?//

//Well, you would just have to go without me, as I don't see how I can manage to get there without using the floo system. Somehow, I don't think Snape would leave his fireplace unguarded against outsiders, isn't it?//, he told her, feeling a little disappointed.

//True…but you can just side apparate with me around!//

Once again, Harry felt his jaw dropping.

//You can apparate me as well?//, he asked in a disbelieving tone. This was just plain weird!

//Sssure! Only baby snakes can't//, she said matter-of-factly.

//Oh sure, next you'll be telling me that you can breathe out fire//

When she did not answer him, he felt ready to slide down to the floor and stay there in a heap for the rest of his life.

//Oh god…and after knowing me for, let's see, nearly seven months now, you conveniently forget to tell me that you can apparate, breathe out fire and god knows what else?//, he burst out weakly.

//But I thought you knew! Surely Severussss would have told you by now?//

Snape…oh sure, he did conveniently forget to inform him.

//Ok then, what are you waiting for! Let'sssss go!//, she hissed excitedly at the prospect of meeting Snape again.

Harry then wrapped Gaza around his neck and let her do the rest.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

He reappeared in what looked like the biggest house he had ever seen in his entire life. He only had one word to describe it-Magnificent. It almost was twice as large as Grimmauld Place and that was saying a lot, seeing as how large Grimmauld Place was.

The house was disturbingly dark though and a little dusty. He sneezed softly as the dust tickled his nose. Oddly, the house appeared to have no living inhabitants staying inside, if the layers of dust caking the surfaces of the furniture and the floor were any indication.

He listened intently to see if Snape was at home. Judging from the utter silence that engulfed the entire house, he guessed not.

//Are you sure this is the place?//, he hissed quietly, feeling slightly doubtful.

//Yessss//

//Ok then, let's this place sparkle!//, he thought with determination.

Oh, Sev was going to be so surprised when he got back.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Snape had just finished purchasing more potions ingredients from Muggletown and he was ready to go home.

He shrunk all his ingredients to fit his pocket and then he apparated away.

When he reached the entrance of Snape Manor, he immediately sensed that something was wrong. Someone was inside his house.

But it was impossible! His home did not seem as if though someone made a forced entry. Anyway, if someone did, the wards guarding Snape Manor would swiftly alert him of their presence.

He carefully opened his door, wand at the ready and peered inside.

Snape froze when he saw who it was. There was Harry, cleaning the top of his table and apparently having a nice chat with Gaza, if the way he hissed ever so slightly and nodded at Gaza was any hint at all. Oh great.

Those two were clearly influencing each other and he did not mean it in a good way.

He heard Gaza hissing and then Harry suddenly whipped around to greet him with a cheery smile.

"Oh hi, I was just helping you to clean the dust in your house. It looks filthy, by the way", Harry quipped.

"I don't remember asking you to come to my house to work as a part-time house elf", Snape told him while raising his eyebrows slightly in surprise.

"'How did he force his way into my home anyway? It's not as if you have the power to bypass my wards", Snape muttered to himself but Harry heard him.

Harry chose not to reply.

"Fine, do whatever you want. I can't stop you if you choose to waste your time playing with soap bubbles", Snape retorted sardonically before climbing up the winding staircase and then shutting the door of the room he had just entered.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

And so Harry did just that. In fact, it was kind of fun doing housework and having someone to talk to. When he was with the Dursley's, he had to do his housework alone and often in silence so this was a nice change.

//Does this place even have a broom?//, he asked Gaza after finally wiping all the surfaces free from dust.

//Why yesss. Its in the cupboard under the stairsssss, though no one hassss used it in yearssss//

Harry heaved a sigh of relief (for a minute there he thought he had to clean the entire floor with a rag) and opened the cupboard door.

"Woa…", was his first thought as soon as he peered inside. The cupboard was filled with everything imaginable! There were stacks of pails, sponges, mops, brooms and any cleaning equipment imaginable. Harry could easily imagine this to be a house-elf's dream.

Suddenly, he heard some noise coming from underneath the pile. He turned to his right just in time to watch Gaza swallow a particularly fat field mouse.

'Ugh', he thought in disgust but he watched her with morbid fascination nonetheless. It never failed to amaze him just to see how she could just open her jaws and swallow the mouse whole. She was so friendly towards him that he had trouble remembering sometimes that she could be dangerous if she wanted to.

He picked up his broom but dropped it in shock when it started speaking

"Hey pleased to meet you, I'm Simon. I'm the best broom you could ever meet, I can sweep dust at super speed and make your floor dust free. Go on, I dare you to find a better broom-"

"No I'm the better broom! Pick me, pick me-"

"No you shut up, I'm the bestest broom anyone could ever have! Don't listen to them, you _sexy beast_…", the third broom purred, causing Harry to blush.

Oh great, all he wanted to do was to sweep the floor and even that could not be a simple task. He now had to listen to the complains of three whiny broomsticks.

"Stop!!! I'll take turns to use all of you, alright", he yelled when he could not take any more of their rambling.

He then picked Simon up, pointedly ignored him and started to sweep the living room and dining room. Then, he used the obnoxious broom who called him 'sexy beast' to sweep the kitchen and part of second floor. And lastly, he used the third broom to clean up the rest of second floor.

He was rather thankful that the mops were far more cooperative than the brooms. Mopping the floor took considerably less time than sweeping, so when the mop asked him to dance with it, he willingly complied.

He grinned impishly as he took the mop and started twirling it around and dancing to some imaginary tune. This was certainly more fun than the Yule Ball as nobody was watching him, save for Gaza and the rest of the cleaning equipment.

Several of the cleaning equipment wolf-whistled while Gaza just laughed at him. At first, he had been rather worried that Snape would hear them, but after a while, he let his guard down and just enjoyed himself.

All in all, he had a blast cleaning Sev's house and he would do it again in a heartbeat.

Therefore, he was rather surprised when he peered out of the window and realized that the sun had already set. It was rather shocking to know that he had taken the whole day just to clean Sev's house.

Just as he was putting the cleaning equipment back into the cupboard, Sev descended down the stairs just to tell him that he would not be cooking so Harry could either leave or die of starvation for all he cared.

'No way is he going to get rid of me that easily', he thought determinedly to himself.

He went to the fridge and opened it, only to find it empty.

"You need to wish for whatever you want to be in there before you open it, if not nothing would be inside", Gaza informed him after taking in his disappointed look.

Ok then. He used all of his concentration to picture chilled pasta, mushrooms, tomato paste and sausages, focusing on their texture and appearance with all his might.

Then, when he opened the fridge door again, he was simply amazed to see said ingredients looking identical to those he had imagined.

'Of to work', he thought to himself before washing the mushrooms, pasta and sausages.

Pretty soon, he had finished cooking and had whipped up two plates of delicious looking spaghetti. He smiled, feeling accomplished and proud of himself.

"What on earth are you doing? You better not be burning up the kitchen-", he heard Snape's voice drifting from upstairs.

"Oh. Fine, gorge yourself to death, just don't mess up the kitchen", Snape told him just before he prepared to leave the kitchen.

"No wait!", Harry said before he could stop himself.

_'Ok, __it's now or never.'_

Harry took in a deep breath before he continued, "I-I, You have some too".

"Just kill me now", he thought in despair when he felt a blush threatening to show. Just great, he had to further reinforce Sev's impression of him being some blushing idiot.

Sev looked surprised for a moment and then he narrowed his eyes. He strode towards the spaghetti and waved his hand over it. A bluish glow appeared before it faded.

"What are you doing?", Harry could not help but ask curiously.

"Checking that you have not attempted to poison me"

"Oh I'm so hurt", Harry joked as he pretended to look heartbroken at his accusation.

"If that is settled then let's eat", he announced as he grabbed a couple of forks and spoons and handed one set to Snape. He started eating his with relish until he realized that Snape was staring at him.

"Waiting for an invitation? You might be accustomed to people glaring at you while you eat, but I'm not, you know. Go on, your food is going cold", he teased Snape lightly before continuing to enjoy his meal.

Snape shot him one last glare before he started eating too.

Harry was twirling the pasta around his fork when he realized something- Snape did not make a single sound when he ate. It was a weird revelation and he was shocked that it took him so long to realize that, but it was only now that he did.

He wondered how Snape was able to eat so elegantly, unlike him who occasionally slurped on his spaghetti.

He watched fixatedly as Snape twirled a small portion of his spaghetti gracefully and placed the fork in his mouth. Harry felt as if he was hypnotized. He tried to tear his gaze away, but found that he was unable to do so as he stared at the way the fork slid easily out of Snape's mouth…

"Contrary to what you think, I do not enjoy people staring at me when I eat. So quit staring as if I'm some weird specimen".

Harry was brought unpleasantly out of his (daydream?) by Snape's light threat. He fought to keep himself from blushing out of embarrassment (damn his stupid blush).

He had never ever found his spaghetti so fascinating before.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

As he was washing the dishes, Sev abruptly told him that the bathroom was on the second floor before going back upstairs again.

Harry was left feeling puzzled until he finally figured out.

'God, I must smell like crap if Sev is willing to let me use any bathroom in this house', he thought in self disgust.

He immediately went to look for said bathroom. Well, it was actually easier said then done. He had to open doors at random for about twenty minutes straight before he found a bathroom.

Once again, he could not help but feel awed at the size of everything in this house. For goodness sakes', this bathroom looked as big as the Dursley's first floor!

The floors were tiled black (big surprise there) and the taps were gold. They actually kind of reminded him of the prefect's bathroom, only this was much grander. Even the lights looked impressive as they had a sort of ancient feel to it.

'Oh yeah, I did not bring a set of clothes to change into', Harry thought as he slapped a hand to his forehead, feeling utterly stupid.

Just then, he spotted a fresh set of clothes and a light green towel folded neatly on the toilet seat cover.

At that moment, he felt a rush of gratitude towards Sev.

He locked the bathroom door before he started filling the bathtub with warm water. Then, he slowly peeled away his sweat and soap-soaked robes and stepped inside the bathtub.

Harry squeezed some peppermint smelling shampoo out and soaped his hair, sighing in pleasure at the sensation of the cool shampoo on his scalp. He then used some soap to happily scrub away the layers of grim and sweat away from his skin.

'Will Sev think that I'm turning into some bloody sissy from the way I acted today?', he wondered for a brief moment before shaking his head at the absurdity of it all.

Nah, all he did was cook and clean, just like he did at the Dursleys. That was no reason for to be deemed as a sissy. If it was, then he had been living as a sissy since the age of four.

He smiled as he drained away any remnants of soap water left from his bath, feeling satisfied about arriving at the conclusion that he had.

'Hmm, the clothes do fit better than Dursley's shirt', he noted in slight amusement as he donned on the clothes that had been placed on the toilet seat cover. He now wore a simple black shirt and some black pants.

'Hah, figures that Sev only has black clothes'. He entertained himself for a fleeting moment by picturing himself as a younger version of Snape, looming upon innocent first years and scaring the wits out of them.

Harry suddenly paused in his footsteps as he deliberated about where he should sleep tonight. He knew that if he left Snape Manor, Sev would somehow find a way to keep him out, so apparating back to his dormitory was out of the question. So he shall sleep on the sofa near the fireplace then.

//Gaza?//

//Hmm?//

//Thanks for bringing me here today. This doesn't mean I forgive you for not telling me about your abilities earlier!//, he warned jokingly.

//I won't expect anything lessss//, she hissed with amusement before curling up on the floor near the sofa that Harry was lying on.

The last thought that Harry had before drifting off to sleep was that he wished that he had a blanket.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Snape woke up a little later than usual, seeing as he did not have any blasted scripts to mark.

'More potions to make…damn it', he thought dejectedly to himself. Honestly, he did not know which was worse, getting forced to make stupid potions such as calming potions and cheering potions or getting forced to mark horrific homework.

"And I ran out of Thornberry flower petals…", he grumbled. In short, Snape was not a morning person.

'What the-'

'What was Harry doing on his couch? Didn't that silly boy go back after bathing?' Apparently, Harry was more dim-witted than he thought.

It was as if Harry knew that he was being stared at. The raven haired boy twitched in his sleep suddenly and his eyes gradually opened.

"Oh, erm, good morning", he greeted Snape blearily.

Snape resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the pathetically pathetic portrayal of innocence that Harry was trying to pull.

'Hah! As if he would believe that that boy did not have any ulterior motive.'

"Why is it that you would rather sleep on the couch like some homeless street rat if you had the option to sleep at your own nice and cozy bed in Hogwarts?", he asked suspiciously.

Harry blinked stupidly for a while before he replied.

"I thought that you would discover a way to block me out the minute I left"

'Oh right. How did he not think of that? 'He had been too busy working on those idiotic potions since yesterday, so much so that that thought did not even cross his mind.

"How is it that you managed to apparate in?", he demanded to cover the uncomfortable silence that had fallen.

Harry still did not answer.

'Fine, be that way.'

He promptly ignored Harry as he went to the fridge to prepare some breakfast for himself. Then, he saw Harry staring fixatedly at him.

"What?", he hissed irritably.

"You promise not to block me out if I go off for a while? I kind of need to brush my teeth", he mumbled but Snape managed to hear him.

"You mean to tell me that you did not brush your teeth yesterday because you did not dare to leave the house?"

Harry nodded.

'How imbecilic can he get? All he had to do was ask for a toothbrush or something.'

"You have my word", Snape promised as he resisted the urge to laugh at Harry's adorable (did he just think that?) stupidity.

When he turned around, he caught sight of Harry hissing to Gaza and then they went out of the house. Snape gathered that Harry had apparated back and had brought Gaza along with him.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

//You know, what is it with you and that toothbrush? You seem to like it very much//, Gaza commented, referring to Harry's near crazy obsession with his blue toothbrush.

//What's wrong? I like it and there's nothing you can do//, Harry said as he stuck out his tongue immaturely at Gaza.

Gaza shook her head in exasperation, almost as if she was declaring Harry a 'hopeless case'.

When Harry was done, they stared at each other, feeling utterly bored once again.

//Now what?//

//You're asking me? I would be hunting for more mice if I did not have to entertain you…//, Gaza hissed irritably even though it wasn't true. She would actually be sleeping, not that she wanted to admit that to Harry just so that he could have another opportunity to call her a lazy bum.

//Now you tell me more about yourself. What other secrets are you hiding? Can you dive underwater as well?//, Harry asked her sarcastically.

"No silly…but I did lie to you about one thing- Severusss doessss not know about my abilitiesss because I did not want him to be mocked at by hisss other friendsss. He does not need them to mock him for having an odd snake"

"Oh so you do admit you're odd. You do know that you're the first snake that I know of that can do all that right?"

//Well, it might have something to do with the fact that I got in the way of several botched up spells when I tried to defend Severusss a long time ago…//

Harry leaned forward in interest.

//What happened?//

//Severusss was attacked by some older studentsss. They looked evil, mind you//

Harry frowned at that.

//Anyway, they were going to hit him with some weird colourful lights and so I came out from Severus's sleeve to shield him from it. It wasn't very successful, but I did prevent some from hitting him. I guess I fainted from the impact. When I woke up, I realized that I could apparate and breathe fire.//

'Hmm, interesting.'

//But rest assured, that's all that I can do. No more hidden powersss//, she told him sincerely.

//Oh and how did 'Operation sssseduction' go? I haven't really had the time to ask for details//, she smirked (was that even possible for a snake) as she questioned him.

Harry felt his face flame up at that horrid term.

//I was not seducing him! I just went to help around the house and visit him, that's all. I didn't do anything!//, he cried out indignantly.

Gaza chuckled at him.

//Why don't you just go govern your own love life? I'm sure that there are lots of snakes in the Forbidden Forest for you to choose//

//Oh fine, don't come whining to me when everything's not perfect with you and Severusss. I much rather hunt than to spend my time doing something as silly as finding a mate. Now if you would excuse me, I'll go and fill my stomach while you brood over your unfulfilling love life//, she hissed before apparating off right before his eyes.

'Silly snake.'

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

From that day on, Harry stayed at Sev's house almost all the time. Rather than apparate here and there all the time, he preferred to stay there, so he packed all his things, shrunk them to fit inside his pocket and brought them all over once and for all.

Much to Sev's dismay, he declared the broom cupboard as his own personal room to place all his stuff in. The brooms and mops were delighted that he had chosen to stay there, as they could chat with him all day instead of getting cooped up inside the cupboard with nothing to do.

"Harry, come on, another dance please! It's been ages since we last had one…", Nippy the mop begged.

On days like this, Harry wished that he could tune all their voices out. He was trying in vain to read about 'Vampires in the 17th century' just so that he could complete his history assignment and here they were asking him to dance with them.

"Aw would you give it a rest? Can't you see that the poor boy is studying?", Simon defended him.

Harry grinned at Simon, feeling grateful to the cheerful broom.

"Talking to mops and brooms? Now that's a new side of you that I have not seen. It's nice to see you so pally with all of them. I'm just worried about your sanity though", Snape drawled as he entered the living room.

'Annoying git.'

"Well I would not be reduced to talking to mops and brooms if you would talk to me more often instead of huddling inside your room all day", he retorted, ignoring the protests of said cleaning equipment.

"For your information, Harry, I don't 'huddle' inside my room. I, unlike you, have got better things to do that requires most of my time. Believe me, I hate concocting all those stupid potions, but I have no other choice. You, on the other hand, can choose to do a million other things but choose instead to just skive off and waste your time chatting to enchanted things"

'Ultra annoying git.'

"But can't you just take the day off or something? You've been working on your potions for what, more than a month already? The holidays are coming to an end you know" _and it's my birthday today_, he added silently.

"Well I suppose I can, but I'm certainly not going to spend it by sitting with you and talking to these mops-"

"Hey what's wrong with being a mop? You look just like one too", Nippy interrupted.

Harry had to turn away quickly so that Sev could not see him snickering away. The sight of Sev getting told off by a mop was far too hilarious to watch, so much so that he knew it was physically impossible for him to control his laughter if he carried on watching.

"You..You mop! Get into the cupboard now!"

"Oh cool down, you hot-headed monster! Come on; let's do the tango to wind you down…"

At that statement, Harry could not stifle his laughter anymore. He burst out laughing just as Sev started to grow indignant. The cleaning equipments were promptly dragged into the cupboard and the door shut with a resounding slam.

"Now that those imbeciles are out of the way, we can continue talking in peace. What do you suggest we do then?", Sev asked impatiently.

"Would you happen to know anything about vampires in the 17th century?"

"Why yes, seeing as I am one…"

Harry felt his jaw drop. 'Sev was a vampire?'

"No you moron, I just felt like saying that", Sev told him in amusement.

"You twit!"

"Do you want me to teach you or not?"

"Ok fine, but that's not the end of it, I tell you…"

Sev tooted in response before he started his long lecture on vampires and what seemed like their entire history. Harry felt his eyelids drooping.

Poke. Poke.

"What!", he hissed out irritably before he realized that Sev was trying to wake him up.

"Oops, sorry. I was just very tired; it's not that your lecture, I mean your lesson was boring of course…Vampires are very fascinating, yup…"

Snape rolled his eyes.

"Right. That's enough history for now. You can proclaim your love for Vampires to Binns next time you see him, though I doubt that you would be able to tell him anything about vampires at all-" Sev started but he was interrupted by Harry's less than dignified shriek.

"What's that!!!? Y-you done my essay! You…What have you done to Sev! You're an imposter aren't you?"

This was unbelievable. The Sev that he knew would _not_, under any circumstances, help him do any homework. (Well excluding the time when Sev helped him to do half his charms homework)

"What a nice way of thanking someone. Yes, I'm a Boggart and I'm your worse nightmare…"

Ok, staying cooped up in his room for so long was definitely not healthy for him.

"And you're the one worrying about my mental health…", Harry could not help but mutter.

"What did you say?", Sev asked him menacingly.

Yup, that was more like the Sev he knew.

"You know, you were muttering in your sleep"

Oh shit.

"I- no you're lying", Harry told him uncertainly.

"Am I? You did say something like 'no more presents, Ron, I don't want any more presents'."

Harry gulped. Sev must be telling the truth, as he remembered vaguely dreaming about Ron drowning him with heaps and heaps of presents.

"Oh really? What an interesting dream", Sev said while his lips curled into a smile.

Crap, he was muttering out loud again. He _had_ to change that bad habit. Just then, he noticed that his glasses were missing.

"Hey, where did my spectacles fall to?", Harry asked while he searched around, looking for them.

"Oh I took them off while you were asleep in case you, being your clumsy self, accidentally squash them".

"Here-"

"Oh there it-"

Both of them exclaimed as they reached for Harry's glasses at the same time. Harry felt his throat dry when his hand brushed against Sev's one. He pulled his hand away as he sensed a mild static shock.

"Well", Harry thought to himself, "there's no better opportunity than now", before he opened his mouth to talk about the inevitable yet uncomfortable subject, which was namely 'them'.

"Sev, do you like me, as in _like_ me more than a friend?"

MMMMMMMMMMMMMM

When Harry asked him that question, Snape was shocked into silence. What should he say? Should he lie and say that he did not, or should he just tell the truth? Or should he just explain the circumstances to Harry and hope that he understood?

Oh crap he had better think of an answer fast before Harry gets suspicious.

"I-There's the dark lord, the death eaters, you're the golden boy-"

"Sev just answer me", Harry demanded and Snape found himself looking straight into those clear green eyes.

"So what if I like you? I'm a death eater, a spy and there's a war going on for fuck's sake", he swore as he felt himself getting royally pissed off at the stupid dark lord for causing so much problems.

"Sev, look at me", Harry said just before he touched Snape's shoulders lightly.

"I don't care. I've thought about all of it, probably even more than you have. It's precisely because there is a war going on, that is why we should cherish our time and that is why we should erm, be together. I don't care what the others think, if you're worried that I would be affected by our age difference? Hell, if I cared about what they thought, I would be locked up in St Mungo's and I would have gone loony because of all the cruel things they have said"

Ok, that pretty much covers everything. But still, Snape felt a little hesitant.

"You're only saying that now because you don't know about how bad things will go. Trust me; you would regret it when everyone finds out". Even though it hurt him to say it, he knew that it was true. And he knew that it was better for him to be hurt now than for him to hurt later on.

"Oh quit acting like some prima donna. I told you, I already thought about it. And I'm old enough to make my own decisions".

Then before Snape could say anything to counter that, Harry had leaned forward and kissed him, straddling him in the process.

Whatever thoughts or hesitation he had been thinking about was thrown out of the window as soon as Harry's lips touched his. Instinct took over and soon he found himself kissing back.

Screw Voldemort and his gang. For now, there was only Harry in the picture.

He closed his eyes and let himself enjoy the kiss fully. Now he knew without a doubt that he was gay, if those wild feelings of his were any indication at all.

As Harry's hands wandered down, he could not help but open his eyes in alarm. As much as he hated to say this and ruin the mood, he knew he had to.

"Harry. Harry, you have to stop. If you don't stop, then I'm not sure that I can control myself anymore", _not that I have much self control in the first place_, he added mentally.

"Then don't control yourself", Harry replied simply.

Snape wanted to smack his hand to his forehead in annoyance.

'Honestly, Harry was far too naïve to be a seventeen year old. Fine, if he had to spell it out word for word, then he would.'

"What I mean is, if you don't stop, then we might end up having sex", Snape told him monotonously.

Harry blinked for a while before he had a determined expression on his face.

"Ok then, I'm ready"

That was all Snape needed to hear. He pulled Harry's shirt off in one swift movement; inwardly smirking at Harry's astounded expression and then proceeded to lay trails of kisses from the side of Harry's neck all the way down.

The way Harry's voice vibrated in his chest as he moaned simply turned him on.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Harry wasted no time as he helped Snape to unzip his pants while Snape was busy marking Harry's neck. Soon, Snape's pants lay in a puddle near them and it was casually strewn some where over their shoulders.

Harry nearly grumbled at the loss of Snape's tongue upon his skin as he unzipped Harry's pants. Now both of them were nearly naked, save for their briefs and Snape's shirt. Now that wouldn't do, would it?

Therefore Harry eagerly took off Snape's shirt, smiling mischievously as he swore he heard a tearing sound.

"That was a new shirt, you know", Sev grumbled but judging by his teasing tone, Harry doubted that he minded.

Harry's hands slid down Snape's stomach, all the way onto his clothed manhood. As he touched it, he was satisfied to hear him moan.

Suddenly, he realized that he was the one flat on his back and Sev was the one on top of him. And he realized that both of them were completely naked (how the hell did that happen so fast?)

"Enough fooling around", Sev hissed in his ear huskily before stroking him

Harry could not help but bite his bottom lip to stop himself from gasping at the sensation of Snape's hand suddenly touching him. He had dreamt about it, but reality was rather different. It was more…intense. He could feel himself hardening almost instantly.

He smirked as he returned the favour, particularly enjoying the moment when he realized that Sev was actually shaking with need. Who knew that Harry would actually reduce the potions master to this state? He would have laughed and recommended St Mungo's if someone told him a year ago that he would be having sex and yet enjoy it with Professor Snape, but yet he found himself in that exact situation.

He shut his eyes as he felt his stomach tightening, almost as if there was someone tugging at some string at his stomach.

"I'm going to come", he whispered as he fought to keep himself from coming all over Snape.

"Just hold on for a while, a while more"

Then, he felt something hard pressing into his butt. He could not help but let out a small whimper.

"Shh, it's ok; I'm going to prepare you now before I enter. It's going to be alright", Sev said soothingly with surprising amount of gentleness.

Harry closed his eyes and tried to get used to the foreign feeling. Soon, he felt another finger joining the first one that had entered him. He gritted his teeth to keep himself from yelling out.

The two fingers were gone and he felt the sensation of Snape's cock being positioned at his entrance.

"Are you ready?"

He smiled as he realized that he was more ready than ever. He nodded.

Snape gently entered him and he hissed as he felt it pushing inside of him. Slowly but surely, the pain began to fade away. Snape waited for a while before he started moving. And then, the pleasure started coming.

Wave after wave of pleasure seized Harry, threatening to engulf him. Both of them were sweating now, their glistening bodies fused as one.

At long last, Harry could not control himself anymore. His stomach clenched painfully for the last time before he spilled his whitish seed all over Sev's stomach and the world blackened for a second before it regained its colour.

He soon felt Snape coming inside of him as well before he left him. Both of them lay down on the floor for a moment, panting and trying to catch their breath.

"That was…nice", he told Sev, feeling fully satisfied.

"Nice? I believe it was more than just 'nice'."

"I just can't think of any suitable word to describe it"

Snape smirked at him.

"Dim witted"

"Annoying git"

"Imp"

"Sarcastic bully"

"I am not going to act all immature and exchange insults with you. I would rather go and prepare dinner now, seeing as its nearly dinner time"

'Oh really?' He did not notice.

"Sev? That's the best birthday present anyone has ever given to me"

"Huh", Snape commented before he went about gathering his clothes.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Snape pretended to concentrate on supervising the chopping of the carrots, but actually he was in deep thought. He was thinking about how he would tell Harry about his crush on James. He knew that he would have to tell him someday, just not now. It would not be fair to him if he kept that a secret.

Now was not the time, however. He would find a way to tell him so that Harry would understand.

Snape felt relieved that he no longer had to deny his feelings about Harry, but they still had to have a little secrecy about their relationship, in case the Dark Lord caught wind of it and used it to their advantage.

He could only hope for the best and let things happen. Meanwhile, he would do all that he could to protect Harry.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Harry groaned as he woke up.

_'Oh joy_. Time for school.' Somehow, he felt less than happy at the prospect of going back to face humongous piles of homework again. Holidays were nice, but all good things must come to an end.

He smiled as he remembered yesterday. Yesterday was simply amazing. He knew without a doubt that he had done the right thing, for how can something that feels so right be wrong?

He was not disillusioned, however and he knew of all the potential dangers that he and Snape might face if the news of their relationship went into the wrong hands (namely Voldemort). He also knew that not everybody would be accepting of their relationship.

Gay relationships were not common in the wizarding world, but he did know of a few. He imagined the reporters would have a field day if they ever found out that their precious 'Golden Boy' was gay. He could only hope that he would stay off the front page of the newspapers for now.

Harry did know without a doubt that Ron and Hermione would stand by him though. He could trust them with his life. Though he did imagine that Ron would look rather green and Hermione would look like she wanted to faint, but he knew eventually that they would stand by him and support him no matter what.

He would tell them first then announce it to everyone when the war was finally over and if the rest of the wizarding world refused to accept that fact then they could be damned for all he cared.

Speaking of which…

"Hey Ron! Hey Hermione! I've got something to tell you", he greeted them as he pushed his trolley towards them, intending to spill the beans to them.

He decided to take things as they come.

-The End-

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There! I've finally finished writing this story. I would like to thank everyone who reviewed and patiently waited for each chapter. It'll be nice if you review, since it's the last chapter. Now don't mind me while I go and pop some champagne to celebrate the fact that I have finally completed my fic!

P.S. Even if it's eons of years from the date of completion, it is still definitely wonderful to have some reviews for this story:)

-Blue

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